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THE
UN LIGHTED HOUSE
A NOVEL
BY
JAMES HAY, Jr.
Author of “The Winning Clue,” “The Melwood
Mystery,” “No Clue!” etc.
NEW YORK
DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY

1921


BY
CopyRIGHT, 1921,
DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY, INo.
wall. BALLou company
eine Hakaton and Mikw York


i
TO
MY BELOVEd Aunt
MRS. LUCIEN BROOKING TATUM


••….……
_- ------------
--*** -
*~~~~ * ！_！…* - -


charter-
II
III
IV
VI
VII
IX
XI
XII
XIII
XIV
XV
XVI
XVII
XVIII
XIX
XX
XXI
XXII
XXIII
XXIV
XXV
XXVI
CONTENTS
MR. REVIS APPEARs . . . .
UNDER COMPULSION .
MR. MALLOY's ULTIMATUM . .
MISS HASKELL’s DECISION
IN THE REVIS House,
“A PERSONAL MATTER’”
THE Loquacious Miss Colvin .
IN MISS HASKELL's ROOM .
“You R CHANCE TO ESCAPE"
THE GOLD GLOVE-BUTTONER
WHAT DR. FELTON SAW .
DARDEN PLANS HIS CAMPAIGN .
THE SENATOR ADVISES
THE DETERMINING FACTOR .
AN INTERESTING PHOTOGRAPH .
THE THOROUGH MR. REVIS .
THE PASSING DAYS
A NEW ATTACK - -
CONTRIBUTED BY MISS COLVIN .
SENATORIAL SECRETS .
MRS. BUCKNER CALLS - -
“THE UNANswerabLE Evidence”
“NOW YOU KNOW! ”
THE THEFT
THE MURDER . - -
THE LAST OF THE MYSTERY .
... 107
. 117
. 131
. 142
. 150
. 162
. 172
. 182
. 192
. 201
. 210
. 223
. 237
. 248
. 259
. 278





THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
I
MR. REVIS APPEARS
44 E even asked about your apartment,”
H Senator Buckner said, a note of ridi-
cule in his bass voice; “who else was
there that night — where I left my overcoat while
you and I were in the living room.”
“Intimating that the theft was committed
there!” exclaimed the young woman at his left.
Her voice was so sharp with indignant surprise
that Miss Colvin, the other member of their party,
interrupted a staring survey of the crowded sup-
per room to turn toward her. But the girl’s face,
more than her tone, impressed the older woman.
For the first time that evening its look of radi-
ant happiness, too frank, perhaps, in its adora-
tion of the man beside her, had dissolved, giving
place to uneasiness.
“What theft, Mary? Where?” Miss Colvin
demanded abruptly.
Her small black eyes glittered keenly above
high, salient cheekbones. Her gaunt features
I


2 TEIE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
were suddenly surprisingly alert, as if she sus-
pected her companions of wishing to conceal
something from her. As she put the query, lean-
ing against the table to diminish the distance
between herself and Miss Haskell opposite, she
gave the impression of darting forward, of eager-
ness to pounce upon the facts for which she had
asked.
Miss Haskell with a glance passed the question
on to Buckner.
He prefaced his reply with a look about him,
making that precautionary move a reminder to
both of the women that what they said might be
overheard, despite the protecting curtain of noises
under which they spoke — silver tinkling to the
soft clash of crockery, the monotone bass of men's
voices shot through with the sharper ring of
women’s protests and laughter. From the corner
where they sat, with only one row of tables be-
tween them and the wall, the narrow length of the
Willard palm room fell away, a white plane of
damask and glass surmounted by incessantly
stirred clusters of human faces — the usual
Saturday night assemblage there, composed of
all kinds of people, high and low, entertainers
and hangers-on, climbers and the already arrived,
of every station from occasional department
clerks to diplomats and, at least, one member of
the President's cabinet.


MR. REVIS APPEARS 3
To Mary Haskell the scene was a perfect repre-
sentation of all that part of life which she cata-
logued as careless gaiety, desirable levity. She
found it impossible to believe that anybody there
had either the time or the inclination to pry into
the secrets of others. And yet, she could not
throw off the uneasiness that shadowed the vivid
beauty of her face. Something in the senator's
carefully lowered voice vaguely dismayed her.
Replying to Miss Colvin, he displayed an in-
dignation entirely unwarranted by what he said.
“We don't know that there's been any theft.
There's talk of it — a possibility.”
“Theft of what, Senator?” Miss Colvin pur-
sued, her voice keyed now to his prudence.
“Information,” he said brusquely, and turned
to Miss Haskell.
He was accustomed to having others comply
with his moods. The newspapers described him
as “forceful,” “dominant,” adjectives which
gave a true picture of the impression made by his
powerful physique, his sonorous bass voice and
the rather severe heaviness of his features. And
he was conscious of his strength — you saw that
frequently in his expression, a trick of lifted
brow and half-expanded nostril — a mental atti-
tude for which there was excuse, since at the
age of forty-three he was credited with real lead-
ership in the Senate.


4 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
But Miss Colvin's curiosity was not to be de-
nied by “dominance" or reputed greatness.
“What sort of information?” she persisted.
“Confidential — facts of vital importance to
the State Department and the White House,”
he said, still careful to keep his voice so low
that it was like a rumble.
“About What?”
Miss Haskell sighed her impatience.
“But, Mary,” Miss Colvin remonstrated, “I
thought I heard you say the stealing was done
in our apartment — rather, yours! Naturally,
I want to know about it.”
“I only mentioned it, felt it my duty to men-
tion it,” Buckner explained, in the manner of one
determined to go through with an annoying task
quickly, “because tomorrow you and Miss Has-
kell will be questioned by a man who's investi-
gating the matter — Darden's his name, Mr.
George Darden, from the Department of Justice.
The information that was stolen, Darden says,
was known only to the President, the State
Department people and myself. I was
given a paper, a draft containing those facts,
and —”
“Information about what?” Miss Colvin in-
terrupted, turning in her chair and thrusting
forward her face so that her thin neck, encased
in a tight collar, was queerly elongated.


MR. REVIS APPEARS 5
“That,” he said curtly, “I’m not at liberty to
tell.”
Still Miss Colvin was unabashed.
“But Mary's apartment — what's that got to
do With it?”
“A great deal, according to Darden. I was
there the only evening that I had that draft
outside of my office safe. It was in my over-
coat pocket.”
“Last Sunday night?”
44 Yes.”
“And this Mr. Darden, this secret agent, ac-
tually believes the paper was stolen then, while
you and Mary were in the living room?”
“He doesn't say any such thing!” Buckner
corrected her, with growing asperity. “He said
he had to look the flat over and question you,
both of you; said it was his duty, which is true,
I suppose. He's got to look everywhere. He
can't take any chances.”
Miss Haskell did not follow their dialogue.
It reviewed facts which the senator had given
her a few minutes before. She was trying to
explain satisfactorily to herself the anger and
annoyance he had showed while warning her of
Darden's questioning. Why should the Honour-
able Grimes Buckner, chairman of the Senate
committee on foreign relations, have any feeling
one way or the other about the affair? That he


6 THE UNLIGHTED EIOUSE
should regret the loss of the confidential infor-
mation, was natural enough, she thought. He
would not, of course, welcome the intimation
that possibly he had allowed a government secret
to fall into the hands of an outsider. But why
should he resent so keenly Darden's questioning
her? -
A line showed faintly between her brows. She
had so enjoyed the evening, the whole Cind-
erella-like experience! She was always like that,
either on the far, glimmering heights of exulta-
tion, or plunged into the profoundest depths of
gloom! Tonight, at the theatre, she had been
perfectly and ecstatically happy. Nothing had
been wanting — every detail exquisite in an eve-
ning which really was the beginning of the sen-
ator's announcement to the world that at last
he had found the woman who would be his wife.
A change had come — her mood had reflected
the trouble of his — soon after they had taken
their places here, in the palm room. She real-
ized now, all at once, the cause of his depres-
sion, realized it without being able to explain
it: he had felt, and hated, the necessity of telling
her about Darden' But why his intense aver-
sion to mentioning so unimportant a thing? It
was unreasonable; he – She would ask him.
She was aware of a halt in Miss Colvin's rapid-
fire interrogation. The room seemed strangely


MR. REVIS APPEARS 7
quiet — or was the strangeness within herself?
There were times when she felt like this, de-
tached, cold, as if danger threatened her, as if
premonition of injury partially blotted out her
surroundings.
She looked up and met the senator's glance.
Miss Colvin, turned away from him in her chair,
was staring at the tables near her.
Mary spoke to him in a half-whisper: “Why
were you so upset by the idea of that man's com-
ing to see me?”
“Don’t you understand?” he replied, with a
sort of fierceness.
“No,” she said, greatly surprised. “I wish
I did.”
“It's because there may be publicity as a re-
sult of this affair. It may get into the news-
papers. And I don’t want you connected with
it.”
“But why, exactly?”
“Because I simply won't have scandal, any
hint of it, touching the woman I’m going to
marry : " He spoke in a subdued, intense tone,
his eyes lowered, as if he feared to reveal to out-
siders the depth of his passion. “You’re apart,
Mary, different, higher. I will not have your
divinity touched by — I’m like my mother in
that. I can’t bear the idea of your being involved
in newspaper gossip.”


MR. REVIS APPEARS 9
the chair pulled back for him by the waiter, at
a table where three other men were already
seated. And in that moment he had seen her,
his gaze travelling straight to her, across the
seven tables between them.
Even in the anguish of her terror she found
time to resent the instantaneous promptness with
which he had looked at her. It was as if a
malign fate, having determined to subject her
to this impossible catastrophe, had also decided
to give her no time to build up her defence, to
seek an escape. She saw the immediate recogni-
tion born in his features, and his intention to
bow — to bow, with a smile, to her!
She would not permit that — not if she had to
cry out, commanding him with her own voice
above the sound of the music —
She stood up, with startling abruptness.
“Why, my dear! What's the matter?”
Buckner's question had the ring of reproval.
She felt that he was distinctly displeased by this
interruption of the endearing sentence which she
had heard him begin — or had he uttered several
sentences since she had last known what he said?
“It's nothing — the cloakroom a moment.”
She said that with a naturalness which sur-
prised her, moving her head a little to let the
words drift over her shoulder. But she did not


10 THE UNLIGHTED BIOUSE
look at him. And, as she spoke, she started for-
ward with slightly hurried step, ostensibly to
make her way to the cloakroom, in reality to go
as swiftly as she dared toward the table where
the newcomer Sat.


II
UNDER COMPULSION
HE realized the difficulties of her position
as clearly as if she had been reading in a
book, in the quiet of her apartment, the
story of another's distress. She must keep her
own body between Buckner and Revis; must
make of herself a curtain to shut from the eyes
of the man she loved the look of recognition on
the face of the other. Twice, as she calculated
with indescribable rapidity exactly where she
must step to keep the line of Buckner's vision
broken, she had to pause momentarily, giving a
waiter time to move out of the path she had de-
termined to follow. Once she had to crush her
left side against a woman's chair so forcibly that
its occupant exclaimed impatience — to which
she murmured an apology.
All this was the work of the instinctive part
of her mind, some self-protective mechanism that
operated in the back of her head, apparently
without her volition, just as she heard every note
of the music, and saw the grey layers of cigarette
smoke floating above the tables, and was con-
scious of the upturned faces of three men and
11


UNDER COMPULSION 13
hand and his touched as they both grasped the
handkerchief. Their heads were together —
here was the opportunity for which she had
planned.
“Look the other way when you rise!” she
said, in a whisper. “Don’t speak to me!”
She was astonished by the sound of her swift,
sibilant words. She had intended to make them
an appeal, a request so desperate that even he
would respect it. Instead, they were a command,
frankly expressive of all the loathing she felt
for him. It was as if she spoke, not only to an
inferior, but to a creature utterly beyond the pale
of decency. Her speech, in spite of herself, as-
sumed the guise of a curious weapon, a spiritual
thing with which she struck at his emotions, at
whatever self-approval he might have felt.
It had, nevertheless, the effect she had in-
tended. As she rose and continued her prog-
ress toward the first exit into peacock alley, he
straightened from his bowed posture, his face
turned in her direction, his eyes following her
receding figure.
In the “alley,” as she went, still outwardly
calm, toward the cloakroom, she congratulated
herself: “It seemed ages, but I was very quick.
Nobody noticed anything. I've saved myself!”
Revis did what she had expected. He caught
up with her just outside the cloakroom.


14 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
“Miss Haskell !”
At the sound of his coarse, throaty barytone,
she quivered once, slightly, all through her figure.
As she turned to face him, she was thinking:
“Addie or Grimes will come to see what is
the matter with me. Let it be Addie. Oh, let
it be Addie!” She did not realize that she
prayed.
The moment she looked into her pursuer's eyes,
a new terror engulfed her. Until now her fear
had been subordinated to her determination to
save herself from being accosted by him in the
palm room. But, with the meeting an accom-
plished fact, she could not escape the feeling
that she was helpless before him, that he would
attack her and that she was vulnerable.
Clarity of thought forsook her. Music, voices,
the subdued hubbub of well-ordered movement in
palm room and alley — all that volume of noise
became nothing but a confused and confusing up-
roar, magnified many times in her ears. The
heaviness of her limbs seemed insupportable.
Her forehead felt as if white-hot little pins were
being shot into it.
So far as she could judge, he was looking at
her accusingly, moving his upper lip so that
his coarse, black moustache stood out in bristles.
She managed to meet his eyes with a level, un-
wavering look.


UNDER COMPULSION 15
“So you know me, don't you?” he said, an
offensive aggressiveness in his lowered voice.
“Yes; I know you — Mr. Revis.”
She was sick with repulsion. If she could de-
stroy him — put this unclean being out of her
path for ever! She shuddered, and caught her
lower lip between her teeth — she was frightened
by her murderous hatred of the man.
He came a step nearer, as if to impress her
with his physical largeness. He was fully six
feet tall, and carried excess fat on his big frame.
His florid face looked swollen in all its features,
with a skin that was stretched to shininess, show-
ing on his nose and chin the large, separate
pores. Although his left shoulder was higher by
a full two inches than his right, he carried his
head inclined to the right — a peculiarity which
somehow emphasized the flashy cocksureness of
his bearing.
“Thought I was dead — maybe?”
She inclined her head, in a slow assent.
“Wished I was, didn't you?” he questioned
again, grinning broadly.
It occurred to her that her demeanour might
have roused in him a hope of her receiving him
kindly. That grin, perhaps, was his idea of ap-
pearing ingratiating. The thought stung her
into a show of resistance.
“Why do you follow me?” she asked, icily.


16 THE UNLIGHTED BIOUSE
“Why were you afraid of my speaking to you
in there?”
A quick change in his expression caused her
to look around. Miss Colvin was coming to-
ward them. At sight of her, Miss Haskell was
fully aware again of the danger threatening
her. -
“You must go back, Addie!” she said at once,
without giving Miss Colvin time to frame the
inquiry on her lips. “Don’t leave him there
alone; he'll come out here. Go back — please!”
“But what is it —”
Miss Colvin, keeping her glance away from the
man, was silenced by the look in Mary Haskell's
eyes. Her question went unfinished.
“Oh, all right,” she finished lamely. “But
hurry.”
“Tell him,” Mary instructed, guiding her with
insistent touch toward the “alley,” “it’s noth-
ing; I'll be back in a moment.”
Revis, when she turned to him again, was
laughing silently, making no secret of his enjoy-
ment of her helplessness. She felt a fiercer
SCOTIl.
“Why do you follow me?” she demanded.
“You, of all people!”
“I happen to need you in my business,” he
said, suddenly serious, and threatening her
openly. “I want a talk with you.”


UNDER COMPULSION 17
She tried to beat him down with her con-
tempt.
“If you try, if you presume —” she began.
But, with an indifference that maddened her,
he broke in: “It won’t kill you — what I want.
This is no place to explain. No time, either.”
“No,” she said; “I refuse to receive you, to
see you.”
But there was no strength in her. She was
thinking: “I made a mistake in leaving the
palm room! I should have let him speak and
denied knowing him. Grimes would have be-
lieved me.” Her own conduct had proved to
Revis how greatly she feared him. Realization
of that reduced her to impotence.
They had been talking in undertones. On one
side, a few yards away, were the elevators, and
on the other a telephone operator. But, at her
refusal, he raised his voice.
“None of that with me. I’ll —”
“Sh-h-h!” she said, involuntarily, looking
over her shoulder.
He laughed, on a harsh, bullying note.
“See here! I don’t want to go to your flat, or
your boarding-house, wherever you live. I'll
spare you that, right now, if you're sensible.
But you come to me. Here's the address.” He
put a card between her nerveless fingers. “If
you don't,” he declared, with evil seriousness,


18 THE UNLIGHTED BIOUSE
“that fellow in there gets some news — see? I
know him, who he is — Buckner — don’t worry
about that.”
“I won’t come!” she said, looking him stead-
ily in the eye.
He paid her refusal no attention.
“Tomorrow night at eleven o'clock,” he di-
rected; “ or he gets the straight story about
you.”
“But what do you —”
“Look there!” he broke in sharply.
She looked again over her shoulder and saw
Miss Colvin at the head of the stairs, making a
warning gesture with hands held close in front
of her, obviously to prevent her signal being
seen by somebody behind her. The meaning of
that flashed upon Miss Haskell at once: Grimes
Buckner was coming.
“Yes!” she gasped to Revis. “But go — go
now ! I’ll come.”
As Revis stepped into one of the elevators,
she thrust his card beneath her corsage and went,
very pale but smiling, to meet Miss Colvin and
Senator Buckner.
“You make me feel so hugely important—
your being so anxious about me,” she managed
to answer his solicitude, buoyed by the percep-
tion that he had no suspicion of what had actu-
ally happened.


UNDER COMPULSION 19
On the way home, however, the success of her
manoeuvre with Revis brought upon her a pro-
found bitterness of spirit. Leaning back against
the cushions of the limousine, she was shaken
by a prolonged shudder. Thinking that she suf-
fered from the cold of the March night, he put
a second robe across her knees. She made no ac-
knowledgment of his attentiveness. She sat, her
eyes closed, lower lip caught between her teeth,
taking no part in the desultory comments of her
companions.
She loved him, she told herself, with a love
that was actual worship — and yet, with her
promise to marry him still warm upon her lips,
she had outraged his trust! Had she been alto-
gether wrong? She wondered. Her motive had
been two-fold: a wild, unreasoning desire to pro-
tect herself, and, equally intense, a determina-
tion to spare him the pain of hearing the dis-
closure. But, back of all that, she confessed
with unbounded self-contempt, had been fear.
She was afraid now that, if he heard the truth,
he would not understand.
She caught her breath sharply. Did that
mean that she questioned the character of his
love? She did not know — she hoped not.
From that, she proceeded to a consideration of
the future. Would it be necessary to tell, after
all? She had done nothing really wrong. Only,


20 TEIE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
appearances — Surely, after what she had en-
dured tonight — She put the debate wearily
from her mind; she had strength for nothing
In OI’e.
He left them at the elevator of the Arlewood,
their apartment house. When they reached the
living room, hysteria claimed her. She caught
Miss Colvin's shoulders and, holding her at
arm's-length, assailed and entreated her by turns,
as the gusts of panic prompted:
“You recognized him, Addie! You know ! It
was Edward Revis —“Lefty' Revis. And you
won't tell a soul, will you? I mean, not Grimes.
You wouldn't, of course — you've never men-
tioned him during all these years; and I’ve loved
you for that.” She changed to threatening. “If
you do tell him, anybody, by so much as a hint,
a smile, you know what the result — I couldn't
go on as — No; forgive me! I don’t mean to be
disagreeable. I’m exhausted, worn out — that's
all. You wouldn't, I know.”
Miss Colvin, released from the bruising clasp
of the girl's hands, laughed drily, minimizing the
seriousness of it all.
“Of course, I wouldn't,” she said, without emo-
tion.
Miss Haskell, a look of ineffable dreariness on
her face, went slowly down the narrow passage
to her bedroom.


UNDER COMPULSION 21
“But,” Miss Colvin continued, hands up-
raised, searching for her hatpins, “you’ll have
to be careful, Mary, I'm afraid.”
“Naturally,” Mary said, from the doorway of
her room; and, warned by the other's tone, asked
her: “Why do you say that? Any special rea-
Son?”
“Perhaps, not. Probably, not,” Miss Colvin
said, the note of hopefulness indefinably spurious.
“I don't know. When you left us in the palm
room, I asked the senator if he had heard the
name of anybody connected with the theft of
that confidential information — anybody who
was trying to profit by disposing of it to inter-
ested parties. He said a man named Revis had
been mentioned in that rôle.”


III
MR. MALLOY'S ULTIMATUM
-
HE long silence was broken by the young
man at the window. “So! My fifty-
first — and last — proposal is spurned,”
he said, knitting the words together with light
laughter, the surface merriment that a man uses
as a scabbard for his deeper feelings. “You
won't marry me. Tom Malloy, the worthy but
obscure clerk to an unappreciative government,
is once more robbed of his hope of happiness!
And the Honourable Grimes Buckner, glamor-
ous in his senatorship, steps with conquering
stride straight into the gardens of paradise!
But there's one thing he can’t prevent ’’: he
laughed again, a shallow gayety from the top of
his throat, and bowed with singular grace: “the
continuance of my love, Mary. Honestly, it is a
sentiment so beautiful in my eyes, so perfected
and superb, that I refuse to have it killed —
even by you, who created it.”
“Oh, don't!” she begged.
He was immediately contrite, and came quickly
toward her.
22


MR. MALLOY'S ULTIMATUM 23
“Forgive me,” he said, and, in spite of him.
self, resorted again to the appearance of mirth,
the sound of it intimating sincere surprise that
he had the power to distress her so.
He stood silent a moment before her, his tall,
graceful figure swaying a little, his strong, ir-
regularly featured face eloquent of the suffer-
ing her refusal had caused him. The contrast
between the smile on his lips and the pain in
his eyes frightened her. She realized more
clearly than ever the character of his devotion,
its unselfishness. She felt an awed wonder.
As a sequel to her new mood, his physical as-
pect impressed her as it had never done before
— how expressive it was of his high-minded,
chivalric spirit! The slight drawl in his words
when he was greatly moved — his shoulders a
little stooping, which somehow suggested aris-
tocracy, the aristocracy of easy-going courage —
his fair, softly waving hair — his appearance of
always knowing what to do with his hands —
in her eyes now all these little things amounted
to a new definition of his charm. That was it,
she thought — he had the charm of tremendous
strength made graceful by pleasant little man-
nerisms.
Did he, could he, love her as much as she
thought? Perhaps — She drew herself up
sharply.


24 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
“Forgive me,” he repeated, “but, really, I
never knew how hopeless it was until today —
now. You’ve always said you couldn't —
couldn't — but I wouldn’t believe.”
This time his laughter apologized for the au-
dacity of his unbelief.
“And I love you so — love you so, in every
other way,” she regretted, looking up to him
out of sad eyes. “You’re adorable, Tom!”
He was struck again by her unusual paleness,
the unnatural languor of her gesture, her whole
attitude of unspeakable dejection. Here, he de-
cided with characteristic insight, was something
bigger than mere sympathy for him. Accus-
tomed as he was to her sudden changes of mood,
he had never seen her ravaged by such grief as
this.
He returned to the window and stood, with
his back to her, casting about for the source of
her trouble. It was very quiet in the apartment.
Save for the servant, audible now and then in
the kitchen, they were there alone.
He faced her at last, confident of having
solved her problem.
“So you're going to marry him?”
The surface of his speech was merriment still,
but its undertone of resoluteness did not escape
her.
“Yes,” she said listlessly.


MR. MALLOY'S ULTIMATUM 25
“In June?”
44 Yes.”
“And does he know about — that?”
“No,” she said, closing her eyes, the lids trem-
ulous.
“Then, I'll tell you what you ought to do,” he
counselled. “Tell him all about it, the whole
story.”
“I can’t. I can’t do it!” she objected, sitting
up straight, alarm in her voice.
All the time there was the suspicion of laugh-
ter in the tone of his words, to soften the sound
of his stern advice. He used his ability to laugh
as a rapier to ward off the tragic possibilities of
the situation.
“But you must. Honestly, you can't hide it
for ever. Things like that don't stay hidden —
for women. They don’t, really.”
She sighed, letting her hands drop to the arms
of her chair.
“I’m afraid,” she confessed, after a long pause.
“Afraid?” He was incredulous. “Why,
the man loves you!”
“Afraid of his love of conventionality; afraid
of his mother. She – she doesn’t approve of me
anyway. And he –” She thought of Buck-
ner's indignation the night before in the palm
room while explaining his aversion to her being
touched even by newspaper notoriety. She be-


26 THE UNLIGHTED EIOUSE
came defiant, to save herself from abject ter-
ror. “I won’t do it! Tom, I can't.”
Malloy stooped down quickly and put his cool
hands on hers. “But,” he insisted, smiling en-
couragement, “he loves you. He couldn't mis-
understand you. And you misjudge the whole
affair, exaggerate the consequences of that epi-
sode. I know the story, and I – it has only in-
creased my — adoration.”
“I don’t care,” she protested, recklessly de-
fiant. “I can’t — I won't tell him.”
“If you don't, there will never be the truth
between you — never, so long as you live.”
She considered that a little while.
“Other girls,” she argued, then, “have married
without telling their husbands little things that
— that didn't matter, even if they did seem bad.
And they were happy — are happy now.”
Her child-like search for comfort unmanned
him. He went slowly to the window and back
to her again, before he could pronounce his pur-
pose.
“If you don't tell him,” he said, “I shall.”
She got to her feet so swiftly that he was
startled into taking a step backward.
“You wouldn't!” she breathed. “You
Wouldn’t | *
“For your sake, Mary, I would.” He put his
hands into his pockets and stood, smiling, his


MR. MALLOY'S ULTIMATUM 27
eyes holding hers. “Think what it would mean
if he found out from anybody but you. Per-
haps, I could rob it of the possibility of harm
to you — in his eyes. I don’t know about that.
It's problematical. But I do know he should be
told by you — now — before you're married.
Besides, it's such a little thing — really. Will
you tell him?”
She sank into the chair, her head lowered, and
said nothing. He, on his side, was silent.
“Mary,” he began again, “I hope I’m not
hard. You know, you must know, my heart is
under your feet, always — and always will be.
And I don’t want to frighten you, needlessly.
But —” she heard the catch in his throat, as if
the news he had to give her overtaxed him —
“but Ed Revis—“Lefty” Revis, they used to call
him because of his deformed shoulder — remem-
ber him?”
She bent her head lower, without speaking.
“Well, he's alive — here, in Washington.”
He stooped again and put a hand on hers.
“You see what that means?”
“Oh, don’t worry me any more!” she cried
out, springing up so quickly that her shoulder
brushed his. “Yes, I see what it means!
Hasn’t it driven me crazy? Have I thought
about anything else since I saw him, myself, last
night?”


28 THE UNLIGHTED BIOUSE
This time he was astonished.
“You knew he—you saw him ' And still you
talk of not confiding in the man you’re going
to marry!”
“I was safe!” she said, disregarding his ques-
tion. “Nobody — nobody in all the world could
have hurt me with that, nobody but you and
Addie. And neither of you would ! It was, as
you say yourself, such a little thing. It is such
a little thing! I know and you know it's noth-
ing! And, at the very moment when it's hard-
est to speak of it to Grimes, this creature, this
contemptible creature, meets me face to face!
When I was on the point of grasping in my hands
the happiness I’ve always expected — the happi-
ness that I’ve confidently known I’d have — why,
I knew that, Tom, even in the midst of my worst
miseries — this creature, who isn't fit to asso-
ciate with decent people, threatens to break me,
to break me, as easily as you'd blow a bubble into
nothingness! This threat, this ruin, after all
I've endured — endured bravely . For I have —
haven't I? Haven't I been brave — and ener-
getic — and fair? Haven't I?”
She sat down near the table in the center of
the room and looked up to him, her lips work-
ing, while the tears formed in her wide-open
eyes and welled over on her cheeks.
Malloy, holding to his own composure by a


MR. MALLOY'S ULTIMATUM 29
supreme effort, laboured still for her salva-
tion.
“Ah!” he said, forcing light laughter through
unsteady lips. “You’ve been always brave—
and fair — the most wonderful of soldiers!
And now, Mary, you can’t be anything but brave.
You won’t give in now. You'll tell — the sena-
tor.”
She struck the table with both her fists.
“I could kill the man!” she said, through
gritted teeth, her eyes now hot and tearless.
“Tom, I could kill him!”
“Naturally.” The depth of his own feeling
gave to the understanding word an odd, thrum-
ming sound. But he did not lose sight of his
main purpose. “You’ll get it over quickly, Mary
— tell Buckner?”
She protested still, her interlaced fingers
writhing one against another: “You’re asking
me to throw it all away — my happiness and
content.”
“I’m asking you to save it — to make it se-
cure,” he insisted. “And you'll do it!”
He forced himself to face the dreariness of her
dulled eyes. She presented to him a counten-
ance that was illegible, as if the conflict between
her fear and his resolution had left her mind
blank.
“I suppose so,” she gave in at last, hands


30 TEIE UNLIGHTED EIOUSE
moveless in her lap. “Yes — I will — at the
first opportunity.”
“And forestall whatever Revis may do or say.
Make your opportunity, Mary! Make it today
— soon — this evening. Believe me: now that
he's seen you, he'll give you precious little time.
He'll be after you —” -
“Don't!” she pleaded. “I’ve told you I'd —
do what you advise. Isn’t that enough?”
“It will make your happiness certain, unas-
sailable, for life,” he said, excusing with a laugh
the solemnity of his speech.
She did not tell him of the appointment Revis
had forced her to make, a promise which she
would have to keep or break at eleven o'clock
that night. f
When Malloy had gone, she took from her
trunk a flat, black book in which, upon her ar-
rival in Washington a little more than a year
ago, she had started to keep a diary. Turning
to its first page, she read what she had written:
“Addie and I are here at last, in the city of
my dreams! My future stretches before me, an
unlimited field of possibilities for happiness, for
peace and content. The past, my past, is dead,
gone. It has not even a ghost. It can never
hurt me, never touch me! I shall pay to it not
even the tribute of a passing thought. Today I,
Mary Haskell, the real Mary Haskell, was born.


MR. MALLOY'S ULTIMATUM 31
That other — she never existed. Thus I look
only forward; and for what has happened I feel
nothing — a splendid indifference. Why not?
It was not I. I — I — began life today. Love
and —”
The mockery of her own words angered her.
She tore that page from the book and went into
the living room for a match, to burn the record
of an optimism so empty that now, when she
considered it, she felt for herself a biting ridi-
cule. *
As her fingers let fall the last flaming corner
of the paper, the telephone rang. When she
took down the receiver, she heard the voice of
Grimes Buckner.


IV
MISS HASKELL’S DECISION
E had called to say that it would be
H impossible for him to see her that eve-
ning. A delegation from his state
was at that moment in his office, waiting to go
with him to a hurriedly arranged conference
with the Secretary of the Navy in regard to a
shipbuilding contract. They were constituents
powerful enough to compel his attendance; he
had no alternative. They would keep him all
the evening.
She wanted to remonstrate, to tell him that
now, of all times, for the sake of their happiness,
she needed him. But she resisted the impulse,
convinced by the finality with which he spoke
that it would be useless. Besides, she could not
doubt his eagerness to see her — this was the
third telephone conversation he had had with her
that day.
At noon he had called to inquire about George
Darden's visit. Had the fellow annoyed her
with senseless questions? No, she said; he had
not. In fact, she had rather liked him, a man
of medium build in his early forties, with pre-
32


MISS HASEQELL’S DECISION 33
maturely whitened hair that curled closely to
his head, and an air of profound melancholy, as
if the revelations of his profession had inspired
him with a sincere compassion for the whole hu-
Inan race.
“He has the saddest eyes I ever saw l’” she
had told Buckner. “Did you notice them? The
softest, most luminous grey. All the time I was
afraid they’d dissolve into a mist of tears!
Even when he smiled, I got the impression that
he thought it wasn't fair!”
But he had been most considerate of her and
Miss Colvin, explaining in a voice that was al-
most melodious the necessity of his interviewing
every person who, in any conceivable way, might
have been connected, intentionally or by accident,
with the theft of the confidential information.
“You see,” he said, “I’m not a free agent in
this. When information, valuable or far-reach-
ing in its probable effects as this, is at stake, our
superiors spare neither pains nor persons in their
attempt to discover the man who stole it, or — a
remote contingency — the one who lost it, for
Some outsider to find.”
Miss Colvin's curiosity asserted itself.
“But what is it about?” she inquired, her lit.
tle eyes snapping, her neck elongated.
He raised a deprecatory hand.
“Unfortunately, I can’t discuss that, except


34 TEIE UNLIGHTED BIOUSE
to say that it concerns a foreign government, that
a faction antagonistic to the party now in con-
trol of that government would profit immensely
by securing it at the present stage of the nego-
tiations, and that the person who stole it – if,
indeed, the theft has been accomplished — would
be able to command a high price, a great sum of
money, for the facts he has thus obtained.
“And, of course, you two ladies know that
Senator Buckner was here, a week ago tonight,
carrying in his pocket a paper containing those
facts. He said yesterday he'd explain that to
you. And he did? Now, if you’ll show me
where his overcoat was — the paper was in a
pocket of his overcoat — while he was here, in
this living room, with you, Miss Haskell?”
“Yes,” Mary answered him. “While we were
in here, his coat hung — I’ll show you.”
She led him the few steps through the door
into the hall and pointed to the hatrack near
the entrance door.
“I see,” he said gently. “During his visit,
then, the overcoat was out of the line of your
vision, and his?”
“Necessarily,” she said. “You see that your-
Self.”
“Yes. Was there anybody else in the apart-
ment?”


MISS HASEELL’S DECISION 35
“Our servant, Lizzie, was in the kitchen for
a short time after the senator arrived. She left
at about half-past eight, I should think. There
is a rear exit, a servant's entrance. She
wouldn’t have come out this way.”
“And you didn't hear her out here, in this
hall?” *
44 NO.”
They went back to the living room, to rejoin
Miss Colvin. Mr. Darden put the obvious ques-
tion:
“And you, Miss Colvin? You were not here
that evening?”
“Not until eleven o’clock,” she informed him.
“I’m in the habit of going to Keith's theatre
every Sunday evening. I did so last Sunday,
and got back just as the senator was leaving.”
“Speak to the senator?”
“Yes. He came down the passage on his way
out as I turned into my room.”
“And you saw no paper in the senator's over-
coat?”
Miss Colvin bridled.
“Pardon me,” Mr. Darden hastened to apolo-
gize. “I referred to the possibility of there hav-
ing been a paper, the edge of it or the corner of
an envelope, protruding from one of the pockets
of the coat.”


36 THE UNLIGHTED EIOUSE
“I didn't even see the coat,” she said acidly.
“I see. Now, Miss Haskell, if I may go back
to the kitchen and — a mere formality, of course
— question the maid, Lizzie?”
She took him across the dining-room and
pushed open the swing door into the pantry.
“Through there, Mr. Darden.”
He thanked her and disappeared. Although
he had indicated the fact by neither gesture nor
word, she knew that he wanted no audience of his
examination of Lizzie. He was a man of marked
but unparaded subtlety. She appraised accu-
rately the tremendous forcefulness back of his
melancholy eyes.
Now, as she sat, chin in the cup of her hands,
leaning wearily against the telephone desk, her
recollection of Darden's ability increased ter-
ribly her feeling of helplessness. She was fright-
ened. If Ed Revis was so dangerous to the
United States government that men like George
Darden were sent against him, how could she
hope to outwit him?
She bit her lips, to keep back a moan.
And misfortune dogged her, she thought.
Grimes Buckner's absence this evening was the
worst thing that could possibly have happened
to her. She looked at the clock — half-past
five, only . For more than five hours she would
be tortured by the problem of what she should


MISS HASEELL’S DECISION 37
do: obey or disregard the summons of Revis to
be at his house at eleven o'clock that night.
If she defied him, if she did not go, would he
tell Grimes, as he had threatened? And if he
did, what then? What, if she told Grimes to-
, morrow, as Tom Malloy had advised? Why
hadn’t she had more time to find a suitable op-
portunity for telling him? If she had only an-
other day — one more!
After Malloy's departure, realizing the good
sense of what he had said, she had concluded:
“I must tell Grimes as soon as I can. Tonight,
if he's still annoyed by the danger of newspaper
notoriety because of the stolen information, I'll
have to put it off. In such a humor, he wouldn’t
understand.”
She had come to a second and more comforting
conclusion: “I’m relieved of deciding whether
I shall see Ed Revis. Grimes will be here all the
evening, until after eleven o'clock. That takes
it out of my hands. It will be impossible for me
to go.” -
And then, with his telephone call, had come
the devastating realization that here, now, this
very night, she must save herself, unaided and
alone. She felt physically sick. When a win-
dow rattled under the pounding of the wind, she
started up, only to fall back limply. She had a
curious idea that she could feel some deadly


MISS HASKELL’S DECISION 39
And, if he was concerned in a plot so important
that government agents were now combing the
city for proofs of it, he would hardly dare to
make to her any proposition that could incrimi-
nate him.
She was seized by a new access of hate, hate of
the man himself, hate of her own vacillation when
considering what she should do. Why hadn't
she asked Tom Malloy to go to the creature and
put an end to his annoying her? Tom would
have done it, promptly, thoroughly, even if the
use of violence had been necessary. She had a
vision of the ugly, swollen features distorted by
the clutch of Malloy's fingers on his throat. She
sighed, in relief, with a savage exultation at the
mental picture.
And, if Tom Malloy could intimidate him, why
couldn't she? That reminded her | She would
see! She went back to her room, pulled out the
bottom drawer of the dresser, searched with flut-
tering fingers, brought forth a revolver, and
stood, examining it, while a blessed relief, a new-
found security, calmed her thoughts.
One of the chambers was empty. She remem-
bered when she had discharged that bullet —
A key rattled in the outer door. Addie was
coming back. She thrust the revolver into the
drawer.
Miss Colvin, however, went without stopping


40 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
into her own room. Mary sat on the side of the
bed and thought of Addie as a factor in the situa-
tion. Would she keep quiet? Of course!
Hadn't Addie joined her in New Orleans soon
after she had left North Carolina? Hadn't
Addie, without directly mentioning it, used her
knowledge of the Revis affair as a persuasion for
her, Mary, to submit to her companionship —
even, at times, to relieve her little financial strin-
gencies? And would she imperil her position by
speaking now?
Of course, it had been convenient to Miss Has-
kell to have the older woman — Miss Colvin was
forty-seven now — always with her as a chape-
rone. But it had been a burden more than once.
In New Orleans the income from what her father
had left, even when increased by her earnings as
a stenographer, had been barely sufficient to sup-
port both of them properly. And that was what
it had amounted to — Addie had had little money
then.
Sure of Miss Colvin's discretion, she again
thought of Revis. She would go to his house to-
night! If he were disagreeable, a sight of the
revolver would restrain him. Her mind was
made up. A heaven-sent elation warmed her.
Afterwards — -
But what of the man she loved? Would he
understand when he knew? Why shouldn't he?


MISS HASKELL’S DECISION 41
She had been fair to him. She would be fair to
him. She had always been like that — putting
off for a day or two the disagreeable, but in the
end doing the fair, honorable thing. She was
brave — Tom Malloy had said so! And Grimes
should know, even if his prejudices, his jeal-
ousy —
How he loved her! She thrilled to that
thought. People spoke of him as cold, “level-
headed,” deliberate even in the choice of his
words. But with her! Only three months ago
he had met her, a government employé, a clerk
in the Department of Agriculture, and had loved
her from the very first, wooed her with a whirl-
wind-like attentiveness, made her the very star
and centre of his existence. And she, revelling
in the sense of security which his love gave her,
delighting in the mastery of his greater age and
dominating strength —
She started, called back to reality by Miss
Colvin’s voice.
“In a moment, Addie,” she replied.
She had to struggle for self-possession. She
was shuddering, so sharp had been the shock of
her return from the day-dream security of her
love to the reality of the moment, a reality which
included immediately the overshadowing menace .
of the Revis appointment.
She quietly pushed shut the drawer to which


42 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
she had returned the revolver. And again her
hatred of the man stormed through her. At the
sight of her face in the mirror, she gasped,
shocked by the ugliness of the grimace that drew
back her lips, exposing her teeth. An unreason-
ing, insensate fury possessed her — that the mere
thought of Revis should so disfigure her!
She would put an end to his influence over her.
She would go to his house tonight, and confront
him, and parade before him her independence of
what he might do or say. She stooped, to see
that the bottom drawer, containing the revolver,
was tightly shut.
“What's the matter, Mary?” Miss Colvin's
thin tones urged her. “I’ve got a theory about
the stolen information. I want to tell you about
it.”
“In a moment!” she said, her voice high and
clear.
She crossed the hall, feeling strong, invincible.


IN THE REVIS EIOUSE 45
Further revelation put aside his half-formed
plan of action. The person behind him was a
woman! The faintest hint of an odour, like the
fragrance of a woman's hair, borne to his nostrils
on the hurrying air — Where had he encoun-
tered that before, that mere suspicion of perfume,
as if its wearer had held lilacs in her hands—
But was he sure? He distended his nostrils,
breathed slowly, caught it again — and, swift as
impulse, himself noiseless and invisible, bent
down until his hand was six or eight inches from
the ground. Reaching out slowly, to rearward,
exploring cautiously, he was certain — the tips
of his fingers had come in contact with the hem
of a woman’s skirt.
As he regained his full height, she touched his
arm, a little above the elbow. He had an idea
that this told him what she wanted — to be al-
lowed to stay there, or to follow him, to see the
thing through. Was it, he asked himself, en-
tirely his imagination; or, under the nervous
strain that was upon them both, could the weight
of her thoughts fall, hardly heavier than shadows,
on the current of his ideas?
Anyway, there was appeal in the steady, per-
sistent pressure of that hand on his arm. There
could be no doubt of her friendliness toward him
— or, at least, of her neutrality. Otherwise, why
should she have revealed her presence to him?


IN THE REVIS EIOUSE 47
orated by again advancing and this time stepping
over the low sill.
The moment he disappeared inside the base-
ment, Darden started forward, only to pause.
The woman was following him. Without the
precautionary backward movement of his arm
to touch hers, he knew that she was there, still
at his elbow, silent and determined. He knew,
too, as if she had put the thing into words, that
she had made up her mind to go into that house
with him, to maintain her position at his elbow.
He reached a quick decision: he would make
no objection. In the first place, there was no
time for argument; in the second, she had, in a
way, assumed charge of that part of this adven-
ture, had convinced him, merely by her invisible,
silent presence and pursuit of him, that she had
good reason for this co-operation, that her pres-
ence would cost him nothing. He was unac-
countably confident of her capability, her skill
in the rôle of a “shadow.”
He went down the areaway steps. At the win-
dow, avoiding the danger of silhouetting himself
too soon in the opening, he halted long enough
for the man ahead to make a considerable prog-
ress into the basement. It was an easy step over
the sill. Inside, Darden, pausing in the hope of
picking up the trail by ear, felt the calf of his
leg touched lightly by the woman’s knee.


48 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
He listened again. Inside the house, the roar
of the wind was reduced to an intermittent rum-
ble, low enough to allow the traffic of other noise,
the clatter of a loose casement, the rattle of a
door in a draught.
Calling upon his sense of hearing to the ut-
most, striving to locate the man in front, he
caught for the first time a sound from the woman
— her breath whistled once through her lips, and
her teeth chattered. To his ears, abnormally
sensitive under the spur of his will, that noise
came like an alarm. Would she be able to stand
the strain of this weird undertaking? What as-
surance had he that she would not become hys-
terical — shriek, perhaps? If –
There was the sound, faint but unmistakable,
of a footfall in front of him. The man was less
than ten feet away. -
The woman had recovered her composure. She
was again merely an accompanying silence. Her
hand, light and without a tremor, fell upon his
sleeve, giving a forward pressure, insistent upon
advancing. His confidence in her revived. And,
almost immediately, she rewarded his trust.
He had raised his foot, to go forward, when
she took the necessary, imperative risk and spoke,
a whisper so light, so well considered, that the
three words touched his hearing like the edges
of feathers. By some trick of her throat, she


IN THE REVIS HOUSE 49
seemed not so much to whisper as to reach out
and calmly deposit the syllables, noiseless little
objects, in the receptacle of his consciousness.
But it was done with imperious swiftness.
“He’s coming back!” she warned, and supple-
mented that with the weight of her hand upon
his arm, guiding him into an embrasure of the
thick basement wall.
Before she took the step to follow him, he felt
the contact of her body with his as she stooped
to draw her skirt above her knees — to escape
the possibility of noise from the friction of the
cloth against the wall or, even, against her own
limbs.
The man had turned back. He came toward
them, passing so close that Darden got an im-
pression of a rolling motion of waves of black-
ness before his eyes. It was impossible to see
him until he stood outlined, a lump of solid black,
against the hint of grey framed by the window
sash.
His alarm, whatever its cause, was of brief
duration. He retraced his steps, passed them by,
was lost again. The detective, craning his neck
beyond the angle of the embrasure, saw in a mo-
ment a point of light grow into a long, thread-
like line. The fellow was using an electric flash
whose eye was focused to an opening no larger
than the head of a pin. Although he needed


50 THE UNLIGHTED BIOUSE
light to avoid collision with objects which might
produce noise, he kept the illumination to a mini-
mum, flashing it only at intervals, for fresh as-
surance that he walked safely. The effect was
that of a thin needle puncturing spasmodically a
sheet of black.
He evinced no special haste. Apparently, he
worked with the conviction that he had both the
whole house and the remainder of the night to
himself. Prudence, a many-sided precaution
against making a sound, regulated all he did.
But, after the return to the basement window,
it seemed, he had dismissed from his considera-
tion the possibility of pursuit. He was like some
strange spirit hung to that thread of light, and
following it with irregular, and almost always
noiseless steps, now fast, now slow, and with long
intervals between his advances.
To Darden these intervals finally were well-
nigh insupportable. He was so cold that his
feet and ankles felt numb. He had incessantly
the fear that, instead of treading lightly, his rub-
ber-shod heels would stamp the cement floor of
the basement passage with the thud of a cavalry
officer's boot.
From the woman there came no sound. He
would have been unsuspicious of her presence
save for that everlasting light pressure of her
hand on his sleeve. The fact that the cold had
i


52 THE UNLIGHTED BIOUSE
carpet in the hall was a new menace to the slow
pursuers of the leaden-footed explorer in front
of them. The subsidence of the wind had made
an enormous hole in their defences. The night
became a sea of silence, and on its waves the
slightest noise made long and screeching jour-
neys.
To their hearing, sand-papered by suspense,
the adjustment of the pile of the carpet to the
weight of their slow steps produced a terrific
noise. They could detect from it the direction
and rate of the intruder's progress. Both of
them learned to avoid further sound from that
cause. By making each step a thing of infinite
slowness, they crept forward safely.
It was a precaution which they had to prolong
in going up the long flight of carpeted stairs to
the second floor. It developed into an anguish
of vigilance. Each upward step was a separate
and long-drawn-out achievement, involving an
exactly calculated expenditure of muscular
energy, an unceasing mental alertness.
It was warmer here, a condition to which Dar-
den responded with an involuntary but silent
shudder. While he halted, to assure himself of
not having been heard, there came from some-
where in the hall the rattle of a clock preparatory
to ringing out a quarter-hour. It struck Darden
as a thing of abominable violence — like count-


IN THE REVIS HOUSE 53
less, swift hammer-blows on the innumerable
frayed ends of his nerves. He had the sensation
of being driven into the woodwork of the step
on which he stood, of being crushed under an im-
mense and lightning-like pressure.
For the moment emotion mastered him. He
felt a lively impulse to put an end to the affair,
to spring up the four steps between him and
the man and seize him, to break the strain of self-
suppression with physical combat, with shouted
words, with an uproar which would end with
lights being switched on.
His relief came with a touch of the comical.
He heard the snap with which the intruder's
teeth went together in his first reaction of relief
from the panic that had seized upon him with
the whirring of the clock's springs — and the
fellow's long-drawn, clearly audible sigh, the
sound a man makes in rebuilding his shattered
composure.
Darden knew then that, if he had been shaken
into imprudence, the sound of it had not over-
ridden the mental clamor of the other's own con-
fusion.
The woman's hand, touching his elbow, had not
so much as quivered. She was still a part of the
impenetrable curtains of the night, safe within
the tried armour of soundlessness in which she
had wrapped herself, adapting herself to each


54 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
a
\
move he made, clinging to him with the ease and
lightness of his shadow on a sidewalk at midday.
Remembering that one castanet-like chatter of
her teeth when they had gained the basement, he
took the time now, as crowded as his mind was,
to marvel at her sustained calm.
He wondered whether she foresaw the certain
end of this affair, the predestined violence of its
climax. He saw it. The man in front of him
was bent on murder — there were reasons why
more than one man would have heard of Revis’
death with satisfaction.
And this one was no ordinary burglar; he was
uninterested in what might be found on the first
floor, had passed it by without pause, had entered
the house with the one all-absorbing object: to
go, silent and unseen, to the room where Edward
Revis lay asleep, unsuspecting.
Darden formed his own plan. He would let
the thing go to the furthest possible stage, short
of murder. He would, if he could, catch the
man's hand lifted to strike, or levelling the re-
volver. That would be evidence, proof of the
intent to kill. If he acted now, the heaviest
accusation he could make would be entry of the
house. He wanted more than that.
He admitted his confusion. He had come to
the house, expecting to find, perhaps, some furtive


IN THE REVIS EIOUSE 55
person going out or coming in — something to
link Revis more closely to the theft, or the dis-
posal, of the stolen information. But this —
who, in Washington, wanted revenge, in its full-
est measure, on Revis? — He would see — he
and the woman.
He heard the man's fingernails rasp the railing
of the bannisters, and knew that, in approaching
the head of the stairs, his hand had struck the
curve of the rail at the landing. He became
aware, too, that the intruder was going down the
hall, quickening his pace, his footfalls slightly
more audible.
The woman's touch urged Darden to greater
speed. They gained on their man, were hardly
more than five feet behind him. They stopped,
hung breathless and motionless in that oppres-
sive darkness while the intruder's hand, slower
than eternity, grasped and began to turn the
knob of a door.
Darden heard a light, scraping noise, such as
might have been made by a sleeve in contact with
the side or skirt of a coat. His driven mind in-
stantly formed a picture of the drawing of a re-
volver from a side pocket.
The thing, then, had narrowed down to sec-
onds. A move from Revis sleeping on the other
side of that door — a twitch of this fellow's nerv-


56 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
ous forefinger — the upsetting urge of a noise
behind — any of these might precipitate the
murder. * .
The detective raised his hand, advanced it
slowly, hoping that his outstretched fingers
would close upon the fellow's neck. But he did
not finish the gesture. A sudden, contemptuous
rage possessed him. Why should he handle this
criminal gently? Why not let him go farther?
Why interrupt him before he had begun the move
that meant death to his intended victim? It
would be safe, he decided, to let the affair pro-
ceed.
Under the man's careful manipulation, the
latch slipped away from its hasp. The door
moved silently, slowly. A long line of grey, no
thicker than the blade of a razor, showed between
the edge of the door and the jamb. The warmth
of the woman's breath struck in little puffs
against the back of Darden's neck.
The thin line of grey widened to a finger-
breadth; the door swung away enough to admit
of the intruder's entrance. He went through
the opening crouching low, on the balls of his
feet, without noise, his right hand extended, the
left arm thrown back to insure his balance.
In the bedroom there was a grey gloom — faint
light sifting through the cedar foliage outside.


IN TELE REVIS EIOUSE 57
To Darden, his eyes strained into abnormal effi-
ciency by the darkness they had been trying to
pierce, the place seemed fairly well lighted. He
could see the bed in the far corner, and Revis’
still form darkly outlined on the near side.
The intruder went forward by slow inches.
Halfway across the room Darden put out both
hands, in readiness to take hold of him. The
man was now within four feet of the side of the
bed. Another step, and —
The end came there.
Darden heard the woman's teeth snap together
— once — sharply. The stranger leaned for-
ward, shot out his right hand, had it close to
Revis' head. Darden straightened, swung his
upflung arm toward the centre chandelier and
caught the pendant chain which he had observed
on first entering the room. He jerked it, turning
on a dozen electric lights.
There was an interval of helplessness — the
trio struck blind, while the nerves of their eyes
leaped and twisted, in adjustment to the over-
whelming glare. Darden, the first to see, was
aware of the woman going swiftly backward,
half-falling, her knees unbending, her heels
clumping clumsily on the floor until her slanting
retreat was stopped by the chair into which she
collapsed.


58 TEIE UNLIGEITED EIOUSE
That, however, was a fleeting, grotesque im-
pression. All his conscious energy was directed
toward the man who had whirled upon him with
both hands thrust forward, not with the gesture
of attack but in a posture of defence. Darden
caught the right wrist and, twisting it so that
the fellow's palm turned upward, saw that the
hand held, not a revolver, but a handkerchief.
With that discovery, Darden released him and
would have spoken but for the interruption that
came from the woman. She had immediately re-
gained her feet and stood now, trying to steady
the wavering arm with which she indicated the
intruder while her dry lips parted and shut,
parted and shut, in a desperate attempt to
achieve utterance.
She went a short, weak step nearer to him,
her eyes distended, and at last spoke, on a high, -
wailing note:
“Tom Malloy! — You!”
Darden, who had been regarding her with an
expression of fascinated but melancholy interest,
went quickly to her side and caught her arm, to
prevent her falling.
“And you!” he said, with nothing more than
polite surprise in the words. “Aren't you Miss
Mary Haskell?”
Her face grey with horror, she ignored the ques-
tion, and stared at the man on the bed. She


VI
“A PERSONAL MATTER’”
EVIS was dead. Darden knew that the
moment his eyes had taken in the body's
lifelessness of line, the unmistakable
stiffness that marks mere clay. A smile, pensive
and a little satirical, curled the detective's lips.
He was thinking of the irony, the crass comical-
ity, of everything the three living persons in that
room had done since entering the house — creep-
ing in, afraid of betrayal by their own breathing,
to surprise a man who, already dead, might have
laughed ghost-like over their shoulders if he
had thought them worth his attention'
Bending over the dead man, Darden saw that
he had been murdered.
The detective stood erect, giving each of his
companions a slow, inquiring look. Had they
known it — half-way expected it? The woman
had been the first to call attention to it. Had
she merely seen the body, or —
He stooped again and, with thin, sensitive fin-
gers, assured himself of the wound, a bullet hole
in the left side of the head above the ear. His
60


“A PERSONAL MATTER '' 61
rapid, penetrating glance searched the floor and
furniture; there was no revolver in sight.
The bullet had been fired at close range; the
hair was singed, the scalp powder-stained. The
pillow was blood-soaked. Revis had been killed
while asleep or while he lay, foreseeing no harm,
on the side of the bed. He was fully dressed and
wore a dinner jacket. In that part of the room
the odour of alcohol was faintly perceptible.
Darden drew a corner of the counterpane over
the dead man’s face. Then, circling the foot of
the bed, he went around to the opposite side, to
the small table holding the telephone, in the
narrow space between the bed and the wall.
“Give me police headquarters — Main six
thousand, please,” he said.
His voice was calm, as deliberate and musical
as it had been that morning in Miss Haskell's
apartment. While he waited, leaning his shoul-
ders against the wall, his eyes were down-
Cast.
Miss Haskell, however, did not credit his ap-
parent indifference to Malloy and herself. She
was certain that, in spite of those lowered eye-
lids, he would miss no move, however slight, that
she might make.
She had not followed the two men to the bed-
side. Her horrified whisper to Darden had for
the moment brought her to the end of her


“A PERSONAL MATTER 72 63
-backe;
Withi
ch was
to her
gover
yet)
|
unruffled, confident, showing a swift efficiency
without haste.
From the push button he went to the door,
and, keeping a hand on the knob, stepped into the
hall.
“Servants! – Hello! — There's trouble here!”
His clear barytone reverberated up and down
the well of the staircase, penetrating to the re-
motest parts of the dark house, brought no an-
swering call. Coming back into the room, he
made no comment on the absence of the servants.
With the air of a man in deep thought, he walked
slowly to the foot of the bed, and, leaning against
it, at last faced Malloy.
“You don’t have to talk, either,” he said, his
manner that of every-day conversation. “But
you came in first. And you — do you care to
explain?”
“Only this,” Malloy answered, his voice free
of the unsteadiness it had shown when he advised
Miss Haskell: “I’m not armed, wasn’t armed,
as you saw. I —”
“You had that handkerchief in your right
hand,” Darden reminded, crossing his arms, the
new attitude expressive of polite curiosity.
There was nothing dictatorial in his bearing.
He spoke as if he desired merely to check off the
facts in regular order.
“I had intended to frighten him,” Malloy said,


“A PERSONAL MATTER. 22 65
post, he resumed his attitude of leaning against
the foot of the bed. He slowly opened and shut
Several times the hand in which he held the
string.
“That basement window — how did you know
it would be open?” he continued.
“I didn't know it. I had the luck to find it;
that's all. Somebody else had opened it.”
“The actual murderer — perhaps?”
“Yes,” Malloy agreed, with a touch of eager-
ness, of evident relief; “that would be my
theory.”
Darden, studying the floor, paced slowly
around the bed to the telephone table and back
to his old position. This time he faced Miss
Haskell.
“And you?” he suggested. “Although this
man's right and you’re not obliged to talk, there
might be something — is there?”
Malloy raised his hand, the impulsive begin-
ning of warning gesture, but changed his mind,
let his arm drop to his side.
“There is — something,” she answered Dar-
den. “I was out walking, as I frequently am.
I suffer from nervousness, insomnia. I try to
walk it off. I happened to be on this street, in
the shadow of the embankment on the other side.
When I saw you come up the street so cautiously
and reach the protection of the cedars, I was


66 TEIE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
interested. I watched you. When another man
a little later almost duplicated your movements,
I felt sure something extraordinary might hap-
pen. I crossed over, went quietly to your side,
touched your arm. I wanted to convey to you
the idea that I’d like to go with you, to see what
would happen.”
“Yes; I got that idea.”
He folded his arms again and waited for her
to continue. His pose indicated inexhaustible
patience, and at the same time a tense interest —
created the impression that he regarded her as
the prime factor in all this mystery, that he was
indifferent to the time of the policemen’s arrival,
indifferent to Malloy even.
She had been speaking in swift, choppy sen-
tences, her voice an unnatural contralto. In the
pallor of her face — even her lips were white —
her eyes had changed from their normal colour
of grey to a gleaming blackness. Below them
there were shadows so dark that they looked like
bruises.
“That's all, I think,” she said, after she had
sustained for a long moment Darden's insistent
gaze. -
“Had you been in this house before, Miss
Haskell ?”
“Never.”
She wore a hip-length jacket of black fur


68 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
w
and of a dark-brown colour, corresponding with
the leather of his shoes. The weave and texture
were identical. -
Malloy stood, dumbfounded, both his hands
held up to the level of his shoulders and a few
inches from his body, while he gazed down be-
tween them at the detective's open hand near the
floor.
“You see,” Darden said, suddenly throwing
back his head to look up to him, “this end of the
string in your right shoe has been torn off.”
Malloy retreated a step, staring at the man's
open hand while his own hands, with their fingers
rigidly half-closed like talons, sank slowly down.
He had not spoken when the policemen's foot-
steps sounded dully on the carpeted floor of the
hall outside. Darden rose, reaching the door as
Captain Nash put his hand on the knob. The
detective drew him into the room and closed the
door.
“We’ve something unusual here,” Darden in-
formed him quickly. “Give me time to explain.
Send your men to the upper floor — all of them
— to find the servants or a possible intruder.”
Nash, a tall, lantern-jawed man with a built-
out mouth, evinced no surprise at the request.
He went out to give the necessary orders. When
he came back, he stood with his back to the door,
waiting for the promised explanation.


“A PERSONAL MATTER '' 69
There was an evident change in Darden now,
an assumption of command that electrified his
gesticulation, a tone of authority that substituted
an almost metallic hardness for the melodious
softness with which he had been speaking. His
competence was thrown into high relief. The
rush of events, the swift and fluctuating impres-
sions attendant upon the discovery of Revis’
body, had dazed Malloy and Miss Haskell.
They had not touched this man, whose breathing
even had not been hurried by the journey through
the darkened house. He had been thinking all
the time, at the top of his mental efficiency, had
developed a theory, was ready with his plan of
action.
“Captain, this lady accompanied me when I
followed this man in here. There's something
bigger than that man's murder —” He indicated
the dead man with a turn of his head —“back of
all this. I’ll give you the details later. Just
now I want Miss Haskell to avoid the possibility
of being connected with the case. It's necessary
for my plan. I want you to help me — please.”
“How?” Nash asked doubtfully.
“Let her leave the house at once, before your
men know she's here.”
Making that apparently unwarranted request,
Darden, as if he were unconscious of what he did,
put himself between the officer and Miss Haskell.


70 TEIE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
He had foreseen her surprise, had planned to
render invisible the uncomprehending gratitude
that would show too plainly on her face.
But he had not convinced Nash.
“That's a fine thing to ask a policeman ' ' the
captain burst forth, on a bellowing, semi-humor-
ous note. “My job's catching people when I'm
on a case, lot of people — not letting 'em
go ! 22
Darden smiled, as if he found it impossible to
believe that the man was in earnest.
“It's all right, and absolutely essential — for
the bigger thing,” he said, with an imperiousness
that was somehow inoffensive. “I’ll answer for
her. You'll find her at the Arlewood any time
you want her. But help me with this thing.
Keep it from your men — that will keep it out
of the papers. I shall have to insist on it.”
Mary was on her feet. He went to the door
and stood with his hand on the knob. His pos-
ture, expressing a flattering confidence in the
policeman's soundness of judgment, carried his
point.
“All right, Mr. Darden,” Nash yielded, reluc-
tant, uneasy. “It will be up to you.”
“That's where I want it, Captain.”
Opening the door, Darden turned then to Miss
Haskell:
“Wait a moment, please.”


“A PERSONAL MATTER." 71
He went out and turned off the hall lights.
“You’d better hurry,” he advised her when he
came back; “and no noise. Out, the way we
came in.” -
He stepped aside, bowed.
“Thank you,” she said weakly, and passed him
with her eyes averted, although she was keenly
aware of how intently he studied every line of her
face. -
He followed her into the hall, drawing to the
door, shutting off the light from the bedroom.
“And you,” he instructed in a whisper, “will
be careful about this — tell no outsiders — until
I see you. I can rely on that?”
“Yes,” she breathed. “I can't thank you —”
He checked her words of gratitude by a pres-
sure on her shoulder, urging her to be gone. He
did not open the door again until he was sure
that she had descended the steps and was on her
way to the basement.
Going back into the room, he heard the police-
men coming down from the upper floor. Nash,
who had gone to the bedside, looked up, frowning.
There was no doubt of his distrust of what they
had done in liberating Miss Haskell. Darden ig-
nored that.
“Now, Captain,” he said, “if you'll send your
men downstairs, to finish their search, I'll tell you
about our man here, Malloy.”


72 THE UNLIGHTED BIOUSE
“Want to turn him loose, too?” inquired Nash,
with laboured sarcasm.
“No,” Darden said crisply. “We'll arrest
him for — trespassing.”
“Why not for burglary?”
“Because he committed no burglary — neither
broke the fastening of that window nor raised the
window. All he had to do was to step into the
house.”
The captain was by no means satisfied.
“How about a murder charge?” he argued.
“Ain’t he mixed up in this killing?”
“That,” the detective replied, after a deliber-
ative pause, “we can look into later.”
Nash threw up his hands.
“All right,” he surrendered, with grinning
sarcasm. “Much obliged for not asking me to
kiss him!”
º


VII
THE LOQUACIOUS MISS COLVIN
Mr.Iss Colvin was visibly excited when
she stepped from the elevator to the
lobby of the Arlewood Apartments, a
little before nine o'clock Monday morning.
George Darden, who greeted her as soon as she
appeared, welcomed her obviously emotional con-
dition. He had foreseen it as the logical result
of the strain of her sleepless night. He wel-
comed it because, in that state, she would be, he
thought, the more easily lured into exhibiting,
for his inspection, her true characteristics —
likes, vanities and dislikes.
The fact that he also had been without sleep
did not deter him. The prodigious amount of
work, physical and mental, which he had accom-
plished since the discovery of Revis’ death, had
stimulated his brain.
It was not that he expected the interview to
be rich in facts bearing directly on the problem
he sought to solve. She would doubtless be on
her guard, suspicious, armed with Miss Haskell's
caution and her own. This encounter was to be,
for him, a study of the Colvin character, under
the best possible auspices.
73


76 TEIE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
nutely. As she seemed averse to answering, he
put in quickly:
“I thought she understood that she was — I
expected her to confide in you.”
“She told me,” Miss Colvin admitted, reas-
sured, “ of her following you and Mr. Malloy into
the house — out of curiosity. You know, she's
so impulsive — does everything on impulse.”
“I thought as much,” he agreed. “That's why
I’ve come to you. She told you of my letting her
escape discovery by the police?”
“Yes,” she replied, and added, sincerely curi-
ous: “Why did you do that, Mr. Darden?”
“I’ll tell you. You see, I’m entirely frank
with you — as I hope you’ll be with me. I did
that because I want to find out who stole the
confidential information. My reputation de-
pends on that. I have one theory about it; the
agents of the State Department have another. I
want to establish the worth of mine. And I’ve
an idea that, by saving Miss Haskell as I did,
I came a long way toward final solution of the
problem of the theft.”
Addie's black eyes were smaller than usual,
gleaming slits between half-closed lids.
“And the connection between Mary and the
theft?”
He bent forward and delivered the blow sud-
denly:


78 THE UNLIGHTED BIOUSE
see why I should sit here and listen to things like
that about Mary.”
He took her up shortly, but with a smile that
was appealing, sad:
“Why do you assume that he meant Miss
Haskell ?”
“You practically said so!” Pallor made the
rouge stand out on her cheeks.
“I beg your pardon,” he corrected, determined
to conciliate her. “I meant that, if Miss Has-
kell had known him, she undoubtedly would be
able to give us much help in identifying the
woman he meant.”
She, in her turn, bent forward, to examine his
countenance.
“Is that what you really meant?”
“Absolutely,” he said. “I’m sorry I used my
words so clumsily. If I believed Miss Haskell
guilty of that theft, would I come to you for as-
sistance — against her?”
In her agitation she answered him crudely:
“I don’t know.— You're a detective.”
“I am, I hope,” he said, wistfulness in his
voice, “a gentleman.”
The melancholy in his eyes deepened. The in-
cense of his flattery was still in her nostrils. Be-
sides, if he wanted her help —
“I beg your pardon' " she said, suddenly pla-
cated. “You said you wanted my assistance?”


THE LOQUACIOUS MISS COLVIN 79
“Yes; I do.—You've seen the morning
paper?”
“About Revis' murder – yes.”
The newspaper story of the tragedy had de-
scribed Darden's slow pursuit of Malloy through
the dark house, much as it had really happened
— with no reference to Mary Haskell. There
had been comment on the “happy chance" that
Darden, “an operative of the Department of Jus-
tice,” had been walking past the house and, hav-
ing observed the suspicious movements of Mal-
loy, had taken the action which resulted in dis-
covery of the dead man.
“Although Malloy is held on a technical
charge of unlawful entry,” said the article, “this
is regarded as merely the police officials' method
of holding him until final and unanswerable proof
of his guilt is assembled.” The shoe-string inci-
dent was not mentioned.
Of Revis, the reporter had written, little was
known except that he was “an adventurer with
few actual adventures to his credit.” He had
been, it appeared, well supplied with money when
he came to Washington two months ago and
rented the old-fashioned residence on Thirty-
third Street. His only known associates had
been minor officials of the South American and
Central American legations in Washington. The
police would look further into his record today.


THE LOQUACIOUS MISS COLVIN 81
She explained her new emotion:
“If I could — anyway, it would help Mary,
wouldn’t it? And, indirectly, finally, please Sen-
ator Buckner? I mean, if my help resulted in
your clearing up all the mystery without bringing
Mary into notoriety?”
“That's exactly what I mean,” he agreed, un-
able to interpret her enthusiasm.
“Yes; I could help Mary — persuade, per-
haps —” She broke off, to ask him: “What do
you want to know?”
“First of all,” he declared, “all that you know.
You are, so far as I can see, our greatest hope in
this muddle. For myself I depend on you.
Without you, I don't know where to turn.— Now,
last night, for instance: what did you see? Did
you see, or hear, anything that we might use?”
She was silent for a moment, tapping with her
gloved fingers on the chair-arm, a reflective light
in her eyes — as if she considered her own rea-
soning, rather than his.
“There was, of course,” she said, after a pause,
“nothing before the murder. As usual, I was at
Keith's theatre last evening — got home at about
eleven.”
“So I discovered,” he put in quickly.
That surprised her.
“You did How?”
“Asked the night elevator boy before he went


82 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
off duty,” he explained, enjoying her surprise.
“I wanted all the information I could get.”
“Later, then,” she took up her narrative,
“Mary came in and waked me up with her story
of what had happened.”
Miss Haskell had outlined to her, it developed,
the same explanation she had given Darden for
following him into Revis’ house. She had, also,
narrated with faithful realism all that had oc-
curred during her presence in the house.
“But nowhere and at no time,” concluded Miss
Colvin, “did I get the impression that she had
ever heard of the man before last night.” She
paused, pursing thin lips, stroking the fur of her
muff. “No!” she said with sharp emphasis,
looking up abruptly. “I’m sure she never saw
the man alive.”
In spite of her willingness now to answer his
questions, he came to the end of the interview
with no more information than he had possessed
at its beginning — with two exceptions: first, she
entertained an intense dislike for Malloy; second,
she believed she could persuade Mary Haskell to
tell everything she knew bearing on the case —
she would assume, whenever occasion arose, the
rôle of ambassadress from Darden to Miss
Haskell.
“Although,” she qualified, “I’m sure she
knows nothing. What can she know? If she


VIII
IN MISS HASKELL's ROOM

ARY had gone through a pretence of
breakfasting with Miss Colvin. When
Addie departed, shrilly regretting a be-
lated start for the office, she returned to her room.
“I’ve a sick headache,” she informed Lizzie.
“I can’t be disturbed — by anybody. If my of-
fice calls, say I'm too ill to come to the 'phone.”
She closed the door, feeling a dubious relief
at being alone, able at last to engage in the busi-
ness of planning against the certain and awful
assaults of this day. She pictured herself as be-
sieged, under bombardment from hidden enemies,
handicapped by unfavourable and constantly
shifting circumstances. If she could only know
what was happening! The development of any
minute might be fatal to her happiness, her
security.
She wondered how she looked. Did her own
face indict her? She went to the mirror and,
at the first glimpse of the reflection she saw there,
cowered into a chair, taking her temples between
her hands, rocking her whole body from side to
side. She wore only a kimono over her night-
84


IN MISS HASKELL’S ROOM 85
gown, the two long braids of her black hair hang-
ing down her back and pulling the hair tight,
back from her forehead, emphasizing the pallor
of her skin.
She looked again. Her lips were white. She
began a horrified inspection of the shadows under
her eyes.— She might have been struck there! —
Perhaps, rest and sleep would remedy all that.
She had been awake all night — two nights! If
she should lie down until one o’clock —
She collapsed slowly into the chair. At one,
if she did what she had promised, she would tele-
phone Grimes Buckner. Until then, she was
safe from him. She shivered, reproaching her-
self that she had to calculate the time in which
she could consider herself as “safe from Grimes.”
By one o'clock she would know what to do,
what to say to Grimes. She would not see him
until evening. That could be arranged. Then,
she would go to dinner with him.
But, first of all, she must see Tom. She took
up the morning paper and read again, for the
twentieth time, the printed prediction that he
would be at liberty early today — as soon as he
had arranged for his bond. Surely, he would
telephone her, or come to her. If she could, she
would go to him She must consult him. It
was incredible that he would delay a moment in
seeing her. -


86 TEHE UNLIGHTED BIOUSE
Darden would see him and question him, over
and over, try to build up a special theory of guilt
— whose guilt?
She threw herself full-length, face down, on the
bed and, crushing her face against the pillows,
wept unrestrainedly. The thought of Darden
had brought upon her a terrific depression.
Did he believe her innocent? Or was his act
of last night the beginning of an immense decep-
tion to bring about her ruin? Had he permitted
her to leave the house merely out of consideration
for her? It was not likely. Everything he did
was with a purpose, a hidden, undecipherable
purpose!
There came back to her the impression she had
had of his implacability, the resolute, clear plan-
ning of the man, as he had stood last night lean-
ing against the wall, the telephone in his hand,
his eyes downcast, and his alert consciousness,
nevertheless, of everything she and Tom Malloy
did.
She began to give her thoughts voice, muttered
words:
“That white hair; the immaculate freshness of
his clothes; that musical voice; his sad cast of
countenance, as if he always saw over your shoul-
der something that made him grieve! All that is
like the soft, springy moss covering a rock. It's


IN MISS HASRELL’S ROOM 87
a disguise he's practised for years. His unfailing
self-control — he's developed it at the cost of
mercy, kindness, tenderness! He's all rock! —
What Will he do? What will he do to me?”
She put her hand to her mouth and looked
around the room furtively.
He would come to see her, she thought now,
before he went to Tom. Hadn't he told her, in
the darkened hall, that he would see her? She
sat up, flinging one of the pillows to the floor, and
caught at her throat, to choke down the sobs that
cut her breathing.
What, if he did come? She would tell him
again what she had already told him She had
followed him into that house out of curiosity.
That was all — it was all she would say, no mat-
ter how he questioned, and insinuated, and
argued She would tell him, too, that she had
not known Revis. What else was there to do?
If she —
She sprang up and threw open the door, call-
ing Lizzie.
“Tell the telephone girl downstairs to send
Mr. Darden up at once when he calls — but no-
body else.”
She closed the door and went back to the
dresser, standing there motionless, reviewing her
certainty that she was safe in denying knowledge


IN MISS ELASKELL’S ROOM 89
night, she would have nothing to worry about.
She checked the vaulting wish with a sob, and
the next minute laughed at her own optimism,
the laughter a harsh, ridiculing sound.
Like a child in futile rage, she picked up a
tortoise-shell comb and snapped it into small
pieces. Darden | A man impervious to feeling,
with that insincerity, that surface gentleness —
She pulled the top-drawer of the dresser half-
open, to look for another comb. To get the full
light from the window, she stood a little to one
side, with her back to the door, bending over the
drawer. Groping through a confusion of laces
and ribbons, her hand came in contact with some-
thing cold, like steel.
It was her revolver. She had forgotten it!
In her consternation, a cry only a little subdued
escaped her lips. She drew the revolver from the
drawer.
The next moment she was rigid, colder than the
steel she had just touched.
Lizzie knocked on the door, called in:
“Mistuh Darden's in de livin’ room, Miss Has-
kell.”
Mary swayed backward, caught the dresser
edge, saved herself from falling.
“Very well — in a moment.”
Her fear of the man played upon her physi-
cally, like an ague.


IX
“YOUR CHANCE TO ESCAPE *
ARDEN perceived at once that she
D feared him. She had put up her hair
and changed to another kimono of a
dark colour with wide collar and girdle of bright
red, which softened her pallor. But the signs of
her suffering had not disappeared. He saw the
lines and shadows that made her beauty negli-
gible. Her attempted utterance of a greeting re-
sulted in a murmur scarcely distinguishable.
She did not look at him until she had sunk, with
a tremor of weakness, into the chair opposite his
near the window. When she lifted her eyes, they
were frankly imploring.
“Can any one hear us?” he asked, with an air
of protecting her.
She turned her head slowly to look over her
shoulder.
“You might close both doors,” she said,
huskily, “if you care to.”
He did so, moving across the room with light,
quick step. When he came back, she was looking
out of the window, presenting to him the profile
of her face.
90


“YOUR CHANCE TO ESCAPE * 91
“Miss Haskell,” he inquired, “why are you
afraid of me?”
She turned her head slowly and met his glance,
her upper lip moving, like the wish to smile.
“I’m not afraid of you, Mr. Darden,” she de-
nied, her voice now the deep contralto he had
heard the night before. “I don't understand you
— that's all.”
She was thinking: “I shall never understand
him. He's not like other men. He is fresh and
vigorous now, and he's been up all night, I know.
Nothing weakens him.”
He regarded her a moment, his melancholy eyes
undeniably expressive of sympathy. She
thought: “He has learned to play those tricks
with his eyes.”
“I’m sorry,” he protested, a sincere regret
sounding unmistakably in his melodious enuncia-
tion of the words. “I should be easily under-
stood — by you — now.”
“Why?”
“Because I've come — as I said last night I
would — I’ve come, to ask you to do me a great
service and at the same time save yourself.”
44 HOW 2 »
“By telling me all you know, all about that
man, all about last night.”
She looked out of the window again while she
was answering: -


92 THE UNLIGHTED BIOUSE
“I know nothing about him, Mr. Darden —
nothing whatever.”
“I beg your pardon, Miss Haskell,” he contra-
dicted, for the moment abrupt, aggressive; “but
that's hard to believe.”
Her indignation, more affected than real, did
not hide her sudden access of fear.
“Why do you question me, then?”
“I’ll tell you,” he answered, and related, as he
had told it to Miss Colvin, the diplomat's state-
ment that Revis had said he would secure the
information “through a woman's foolishness.”
She repeated the denial, her lower lip tremu-
lous.
He adopted a conciliatory tone.
“This morning, Miss Haskell, the murder of
Edward Revis is merely a good newspaper story,
a crime mystery good for a column on the front
page. The few hours between now and the publi-
cation of the afternoon papers are our oppor-
tunity to deprive the situation of annoying possi-
bilities. We can yet put our hands on the course
of events, give you your chance to escape trouble.
“This afternoon it will no longer be so. The
affair will be a full-blown sensation then, with
reporters and police trying to focus the light of
publicity on every person in any way connected
with the crime or the criminal. That always
happens. Unexpected witnesses will appear —


“YOUR CHANCE TO ESCAPE * 93
one who saw this little thing— another who saw
that — a collection of bits that build up the truth
and make trouble for too many people.
“With every additional discovery of fact, the
likelihood of your escaping detection will de-
crease. If you are to save yourself, now is the
time. The police captain, Nash, promises he'll
keep quiet, to give me time to work out my little
game — but we can’t be sure. He may let it out
any time.”
She struggled once more with the problem of
whether he believed her innocent or, convinced of
her guilt, smilingly played on her hopes and
fears, watching for any misstep she might make.
She could not feel that he had any real sympathy
for her.
In this, she did not misjudge him. He had
made up his mind that in this interview was his
best opportunity to get at the facts he wanted.
And he was determined to let nothing — cer-
tainly not sentimentality — interfere with his
hard drive for the truth. He worked with a cold
precision, merciless, direct.
“You can tell me, if you will, which of my two
theories concerning the crime is correct. Here is
the first: Edward Revis, having some hold on
you through previous acquaintance, forced you
to help him, or to permit him, to secure those
confidential facts — it may have gone no further


94 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
than a reluctant promise from you to assist him
so — and, at the last moment, rather than steal
from the man you loved — or in a fit of fierce,
unreasoning anger — you yourself killed Revis,
shot him.”
Speechless, she sat hunched far back in a cor-
ner of her chair, her head falling forward a little
so that, in looking at him, she had to raise her
eyebrows and force the balls of her eyes far up-
ward — which gave her an expression of wild
terror.
“The second possibility,” he continued, evenly,
“is that Malloy, having heard of derogatory re-
marks Revis had made about you in his boastful
predictions of using you as a means of getting the
information — that Malloy, calling on him to
shut him up, lost his temper and killed him.”
She raised her head, in a series of short jerks,
as if the muscles of her neck were an awkwardly
operating mechanism. She put her right hand
to her forehead and brought it down slowly over
her eyes, nose and chin. The gesture was like
that of a blind woman identifying a face by the
sense of touch. A shudder, exact duplicate of the
movement of throwing off the fright of a bad
dream, shook her. She was suddenly mistress of
herself, thinking clearly.
“Oh, no,” she said, her white lips forcing a
smile of repugnant wonder; and, after a pause in


“YOUR CHANCE TO ESCAPE * 95
which his eyes were in hers as he bent toward her,
she added: “Absolutely not!”
“Ah!” he exclaimed softly. “Then, here is
the third and, perhaps, most probable supposi-
tion: you and Miss Colvin know enough about
Revis’ acquaintances in Washington — and about
his history — to put me in the way of discovering
the people who conspired with him. One mo-
ment, please!” He put up his hand when he
saw her on the point of speaking. “Somehow,
Miss Haskell — it may be because of my talk with
you two yesterday — I feel sure, I’m staking my
reputation, that you know more about Revis than
you’ve admitted. And I’m going to work on that
conviction — call it a “hunch, if you will— and
I’m going to stick to it until I know I’m wrong.”
“Very well,” she assented, voice as colourless
as her lips!
Outwardly neither disappointed nor impatient,
he began to fire questions at her with a gentle
relentlessness, his soft, musical voice a strong
contrast to her deep, unnatural contralto.
“You never knew Edward Revis?”
&&. No.”
“Miss Colvin never knew him?”
-4 NO.”
“She never knew — or suspected — that you
knew him?”
“I’ve already said I never knew him.”


96 | THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
“And you had nothing to do with the theft of
the information, from Senator Buckner?”
She drew herself up angrily.
“I beg your pardon, Miss Haskell, but it's nec-
essary to ask certain questions, even the obvi-
ously absurd — at times.”
She did not acknowledge the apology.
“And,” he resumed, “you think Mr. Malloy
didn’t commit this murder?”
“I know he didn’t | *
“How? How do you know that?”
“From knowing him.”
“But you know nothing to prove that he's in-
nocent?”
“Nothing — no — not yet. But I know.”
“And you want to stick to your original de-
nial? You never knew Revis? He never had a
hold on you which you would be afraid to de-
scribe to Senator Buckner?”
“I’ve told you several times I never knew the
man,” she said, sighing wearily.
“Who, do you think, killed him?”
“I don't know — haven’t the slightest idea.”
He shook his head from side to side, letting his
hands fall with a little slapping noise to his
knees, a pantomime of disappointment.
“Then, there's nothing else to do,” he re-
gretted, “but to arrest Malloy for the murder.”
She looked out of the window, thinking, in a


“YOUR CHANCE TO ESCAPE * 97
moment absorbed by some special problem. He
saw her frown. She put the next question.
“Why — do you mind telling me why you were
so good — protected me last night?”
“And Malloy, too? You know, I could have
put the murder charge against him then. And
there would have been no liberty or bail, for
that.”
“Yes, both of us. Why did you do it?”
“Because I thought he might not have killed
Revis. I hoped you would help me find the thief
of the information. I thought then, as I think
now, that to find the thief will be also to find the
murderer. And, frankly, I want to find the thief
first.” -
At that, her terror was greater than he had ever
seen it, greater even than last night in Revis’
bedroom. The whistle of her indrawn breath
was audible. Her hands, as she moved them in
her lap, were shaking like things separate from
her own proper person.
He gave her no respite from his keen scrutiny,
made her feel that he studied every outward sign
of her desperate attempt to appear calm. And
yet, he could arrive at no satisfactory explanation
of her panic. His identifying the thief as the
murderer had pleased Miss Colvin; it threw this
Woman into paroxysms of fear — this woman
who, a few hours ago, had kept her nerve while


98 THE UNLIGEITED HOUSE
helping him to follow a supposed criminal
through a darkened house! He was mystified.
Did she think the thief easier to find than the
murderer? Had she thought that the murderer
would never be found, never be proved guilty?
He worried the problem, his hurried brain pick-
ing up and laying down as too weak one solution
after another.
There was a possibility that, if he allowed her
to talk, she might herself indicate the meaning
of her terror; her first remark might give him a
key to the riddle. He sat quiet, politely pa-
tient, his slender fingers occasionally brushing
lightly his close-curled white hair while he waited
for her to speak.


X
THE GOLD GLOWE-BUTTONER
HE gave him, however, no enlightenment.
The question she put ignored his implica-
tion that the thief and the murderer were
the same.
“If Tom were guilty, why should he have
gone back into that house?” she asked, her words
slow, as if she sought an answer to a puzzle that
paralysed her logical faculties.
“For the same reason that you would have
gone back—if you had killed him,” he replied
quickly; “to see that he was really dead — or to
gather up something left behind, incriminating
evidence, personal property, clues of any kind.”
“An absurd theory,” she commented dully.
“Is it? There was the piece of his shoe-string
which I found — practically unanswerable. We
compared again the torn end of it with the end
of the string in his shoe — identical. Then,
there were some finger prints on that far side
of the bed. They may yet show something.
And this —”
He took from a pocket of his vest a woman's
gold glove-buttoner.
* 99
2679;..


100 THE UNLIGHTED EIOUSE
“Is it yours?”
“Yes,” she said in a half-whisper, and, not
sure that he heard her, repeated: “Yes; that's
— mine.”
“You remember that, when I was at the tele-
phone on the far side of the bed last night, I
stooped down once? That was when I picked
this up. Like Malloy, you had not been on that
side of the bed since we three had entered the
room.” He paused momentarily to give her time
to grasp the full significance of that. “Did you
drop it there?”
44 No.”
“Who did, do you think?”
“Not Tom Malloy,” she said, with her first
show of spirit.
“Who? Who, then?” he demanded.
She realized that he expected some vital dis-
closure from her reply.
“I don’t know,” she declared, and added, with
apparent indifference: “The last time I saw it
Senator Buckner had it.”
“The Senator | *
“Yes. He wore button gloves Saturday eve-
ning. I got it for him to button his glove be-
fore we left here that evening. He had slipped
it into his pocket — absent-mindedly, I suppose.
I saw him playing with it, fingering it, once


THE GOLD GLOVE-BUTTONER 101
while we were at supper in the Willard palm
room.”
She saw as well as Darden that her state-
ment provided foundation for another theory:
that Buckner, having heard of Revis’ talk about
the information or about her, had gone to Revis’
house and, in a quarrel, killed him.
“But,” Darden said, arguing with himself,
“ the senator was at home last night by ten
o'clock.”
She started. “How do you know that?”
She was thinking: “He told me he would be
busy with his constituents all the evening! He
has often called here as late as a quarter to ten'
But last night he didn’t even 'phone. I asked
the operator this morning if there had been any
late calls for me last night.”
“We’ve had a man watching his residence
since Saturday,” Darden told her. “In a case
like this theft, we take no chance, leave nothing
open to the thieves.”
She was silent again. When she met his
glance, he indicated the cigarette he had taken
from his case.
4. May I? »
She inclined her head gravely. He lit the
cigarette and brought from the table an ash tray
which he set on the window sill.


102 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
“And you will tell me nothing more?” he
asked, after another long pause.
“I’ve told you all I know,” she insisted.
“Of course, you know, Miss Haskell, what “ac-
cessory after the fact ' means — anybody who
shields a murderer, or a criminal of any kind,
herself commits a crime for which there are se-
vere penalties, the penitentiary.”
That had not occurred to her. She stared at
him, and felt surprised that what he said did
not interest her as much as the fact that the
cigarette smoke wreathing his face was almost
exactly the colour of his eyes. She was im-
pressed, too, by her own weariness, the burden
of her exhaustion. She felt a little sleepy.
He rose abruptly. Even before he spoke, she
had a presentiment that the move prefaced the
delivery of a crushing blow — that his getting
to his feet was symbolical of his desire to make
it as effective as possible.
He studied her a long time. She could see
the pensive reflectiveness of his eyes change to
the hard light of sharp decision. She felt that
he tried to estimate her in some way, to cal-
culate what use he could make of her in con-
nection with the plan he had just formed.
Finally, he told her, as if he took a certain
pleasure in bewildering her:
“That glove-buttoner; it changes things — a


THE GOLD GLOVE-BUTTONER 103
little. What could Senator Buckner have been
doing, in that house? – You're rather good at
keeping a secret. May I confide in you?”
Suspecting sarcasm, she made no reply.
“It may be that you're mistaken in thinking
you're protecting Malloy. It may be also that
your refusal to tell me anything will hurt the
senator. I don’t know. Perhaps, you'll judge
for yourself. The agents of the State Depart-
ment are working on the theory that Senator
Buckner himself let that confidential informa-
tion get out.”
He paused, weighing his words:
“They see a possibility that he did it know-
ingly — as a definite purpose — for gain.”
She stared at him dully, without comprehen-
sion. She had been too long a sponge for the
waves of terror beating upon her. She could ab-
sorb no more.
“I don’t believe it, myself,” he continued;
“and yet, I don’t blame them for working up
every possible theory. Although he's well-to-do,
he's by no means rich. And in the country af.
fected by this information, there are powerful
influences at work, reaching into Washington;
tremendous rewards rumoured.”
Be turned to the window to mash out the fire
of his cigarette on the ash tray.
Still she said nothing.


104 TEIE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
“I’ve told you this,” he concluded, matter-of-
fact, “because there was the chance of its show-
ing you the advisability of hiding nothing.—
Does it?”
She put the tip of her tongue to her lips,
frowned, contented herself with a negative move-
ment of her head.
“Later, perhaps,” he said, without enthusiasm.
“In the meanwhile, if you say nothing to him
about this suspicion of him, I shall not tell him
of your having been in Revis' house last night.
In fact, I don't want to. It doesn’t fit either
my theory or my plans. For the present, then, I
shan’t mention to him either the glove-buttoner
episode nor your share in last night's — well —
discoveries.”
She began to cry, in sheer relief, turning half
away from him, pillowing her streaming face
on her arm against the back of the chair. He
said nothing more. When she looked up, slowly
removing her arm, like a child expecting a blow,
he had left the room. She heard the outer door
swing shut behind him.
But her terror remained. She was afraid be-
cause of her utter inability to understand the
man. Why had he taken the pains to promise
the one thing she most desired, to say nothing
to Grimes about her experience of last night?
Had he read her thoughts in some mysterious


THE GOLD GLOVE-BUTTONER 105
way; or, in one of her bewildered moments, had
he trapped her into a request which she did not
now remember? And was the promise his at-
tempt to purchase her good-will, to buy her help
in his larger object of proving who had stolen
the information?
Dazed as she was, she sighed with relief – she
could tell Grimes about Revis when she chose, as
she chose — when his mood was propitious, sym-
pathetic | Her happiness was still undestroyed
The sigh was cut short by a gasp. She had
recalled Darden's story of the theory held by
the State Department's secret operatives.
Grimes Buckner a common conspirator, using
his country's secret archives as a mean of ad-
vancing his personal fortunes! Other men in
high place had been guilty of just such depravity
— but not Grimes | Disdain blotted the idea
from her mind.
Of the glove-buttoner evidence the detective
might try to make use, in his own time. Suppose
he did? It would not hurt Grimes. Yes; it
might! If he were accused, really accused, of
the murder, she would —
“My God!” she groaned. “No matter what
happens, I’ve a right to save myself! I have! I
have " ''
Leaving the Arlewood, Darden was thinking:


106 THE UNLIGHTED BIOUSE
“It wouldn't be the first instance of a man be-
ing shot by a United States senator — and over
a woman at that! She was telling the truth
about the glove-buttoner — no doubt of that.
And he could have left his house by the back way
last night. He knew it was watched — in front.
“If Miss Colvin — Bah! She won’t talk
enough for that — The fifty-year, flirtatious,
playful, highly intellectual old thing! I'll trip
her up yet!”


XI
WHAT DR. FELTON SAW
RIMES BUCKNER left the Senate
cloakroom at a quarter past one o'clock
that afternoon, in response to Mary
Haskell's urgent appeal on the telephone that he
come to the Arlewood immediately. Accustomed
to cool analysis of everything he did, he took a
peculiar pleasure now in contemplating the fact
that she had the power to call him away from
his work. Emotion, for the first time in his life,
was stronger than the dictates of his “hard
common sense.” He enjoyed the new expe-
rience; it proved his capacity for profound
feelings!
It was characteristic of him that he congratu-
lated himself on having fallen in love with a
woman so fascinating that he had found her ir-
resistible. It justified his initial judgment!
Moreover, he reflected, Mary's vivid and lovable
personality would go far toward reconciling his
mother to the marriage. Within a few days he
would ask the autocratic old lady to arrange for
those formal social functions which he consid-
ered necessary for the proper announcement of
107


108 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
his engagement — and he relied on Mary's charm
to break down the maternal prejudices against
“an obscure and unknown woman as your bride,
Grimes | *
He had no doubt of the outcome. His mother
would capitulate to the girl whose beauty and
sweetness had mastered him. The thought fed
his pride.
A newsboy, crying the early edition of an aft-
ernoon newspaper, caught him as he was step-
ping into his waiting limousine on the capitol
plaza. The streamer head-line across the front
page, “REVIS MYSTERY DEEPENs!”, put an end to
his pleasant reverie. He read rapidly, sum-
marizing the newly discovered facts.
The newspaper, emphasizing the lack of defi-
nite evidence against Malloy, upheld the more
sensational theory that the murder had been done
by a woman.
Roger West, whom Revis had employed in the
dual capacity of butler and valet, insisted on it
as the true explanation of the tragedy. It was
strengthened by the narrative of Dr. Elmer Fel-
ton, a young physician occupying the residence
next door to the house Revis had rented. It was
described as “a possibility” by Miss Lucy Pat-
ton, a clerk in the Postoffice Department, who
had known Revis “rather well’’ during his two-
months’ stay in Washington.


whAT DR. FELTON SAw 109
Detectives and reporters, however, had been
hampered in their investigation by their failure
to throw any light whatever on the dead man's
past. What he had done before taking the
Thirty-third Street house, where he had been,
with whom he had foregathered — his entire his-
tory was, apparently, shrouded in a mystery as
impenetrable as that which obscured the circum-
stances connected with his death.
Neither relative nor friend had come forward
to inquire as to the funeral arrangements. The
acquaintances he had made in Washington dis-
played, when questioned, an unwillingness to be
coupled with his activities or his name even.
Señor Jose Altillero, Washington “agent” for
a revolutionary faction of a Central American
country, admitted — with reluctance — that
Revis had called on him several times. To that,
said the señor, no significance attached.
“When one has the honour,” he explained, an
exceedingly pudgy hand caressing an excessively
pomaded moustache, “to represent in Washing-
ton the most powerful party in one's country,
one is regarded as wealthy, as having at one's
disposal large sums of money.” He rolled pon-
derously in his chair, the motion permeating the
air with violent and oppressive perfumery. “A
vast mistake,” he lamented, emitting a porcine
noise intended as a sigh; “a mistake which sub-


110 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
jects one to being bored extremely by unprinci-
pled and avaricious persons.
“I know nothing of the gentleman. I avoided
him whenever it was possible. It pains me to
be brutal, even in dealing with a beggar. It is,
perhaps, as well — how? — that he is now at
rest.”
Dr. Felton's story dealt with the preceding
evening. He was uncertain as to the time; it
might have been half-past ten or as late as a
quarter past eleven; he had been reading in his
library before going out to his garage to see that
it was properly heated.
“My back door being locked,” he said, “I went
out by the front. From the porch steps I ob-
served, as a man does in looking around at night,
that the Revis house had lights on the second
floor, first floor and in the basement. At the very
moment that I glanced in that direction the light
in Revis’ bedroom on the second floor was turned
out. I had often looked over there at night and
had located that window as being in his bed-
FOOIn.
“The next moment the light in the second-
floor hall was turned out. I was struck by the
thought: “Those lights, winking out that way,
tell a story of their own, mark somebody's prog-
ress through the house.’ I was struck, too, by
the hall light going out after the bedroom light.


WEHAT DR. FELTON SAW 111
w
At that hour Revis would have been going to
bed, and, if he had been turning off lights, they
would have gone out in reverse order.
“While I considered that, the first-floor hall
lights went ont. Then, after a very brief inter-
val, the basement window was darkened. All
this had been done so quickly that I could fancy
Revis or his valet hurrying down through the
house, snapping off the lights as he went. But
I wondered why, at that hour.
“I got the answer when I saw a form come
up out of the areaway in front. I thought at
first it was a woman's form. I’m not sure now.
If it wasn't a woman, it was a slender man wear-
ing a long coat. But I think it was a woman.
She was running — or, I might say, she was go-
ing at a fast dog-trot, a queer, loping run. She
might have been a little lame.
“She was tall, for a woman, and had light
hair. But I can’t be sure about the hair either.
What I took for blonde hair might have been a
few stray dark strands, escaping from beneath
her small hat and showing up like an aura, with
the light from the street lamp at her back.
“She cut around the corner on my side and
went back toward the alley behind. You see,
that house and mine are old-fashioned resi-
dences set back from the street and in spacious
grounds. I was thirty yards from her, but I


WEHAT DR. FELTON SAW 113
had been employed by him only seven weeks
ago.
Miss Patton showed no enthusiasm when of-
fered the opportunity to tell what she knew
about her mysterious friend. Nearing thirty
years of age, a tall blonde who knew how to make
the most of a naturally striking figure, she was
decidedly good-looking — so the reporter wrote
— when, flushed by indignation, she resented the
servant's implication that she had been an ha-
bitual visitor to the Thirty-third Street house.
“Once,” she elucidated, “I mistook the date
for an afternoon tea, and, of course, going there
on the wrong day, I was alone — and promptly
left. On another occasion, the other couple —
married, by the way,+ had been unavoidably pre-
vented from keeping the engagement.”
She knew nothing of Revis’ past. He had con-
fided none of his plans to her. There was, she
believed, “an impression that he was about to
come into a large sum of money.” She could not
remember that he had said so. He had certainly
not said from where the money would come.
Her belief had been that he would earn it through
his own exertions.
“You were not in Mr. Revis' house yesterday
or last night?” Captain Nash asked her.
Her denial was indignant. She had spent the
evening in her own little bachelor flat on N


WELAT DR. FELTON SAW 115
him, but I wouldn't call it a heated colloquy. It
related to a personal matter.— No; I wasn’t inti-
mate with him. I acted rather on behalf of a
third party, a woman.”
On that he stood, refusing to give the woman's
name, declaring that it would be of no help in
finding the murderer. Of his own guilt, he made
positive denial. He had intended to intimidate
Revis — nothing more.
“The action of the police speaks for itself,” he
told the reporter. “It’s true that there's a
charge of trespassing against me. But that's
different — isn’t it? — from being locked up for
murder.”
In the afternoon paper's stories, as in the
morning editions, there was no reference to Mary
Haskell or Senator Buckner, no mention of the
theft of the confidential information. Once
again the public, through an agreement between
city police and federal secret agents, was kept
in ignorance of the true motives back of a crime
—“solely in the public interest.” The agree-
ment held, tight. Captain Nash, with a whole-
some respect for George Darden’s forceful logic,
kept his own counsel.
Senator Buckner, throwing away the news-
paper as he left his car in front of the Arlewood,
felt distinctly relieved.


XII
DARDEN PLANS HIS CAMPAIGN
APTAIN NASH dawdled with official
looking documents on the flat-topped
desk in his barely furnished office. At
frequent intervals he pushed his spectacles high
up on his forehead, to look with unconcealed im-
patience at George Darden who, with feet rest-
ing on the low window sill, gazed with unseeing
eyes toward a high, blank brick wall, the only
perspective the outlook offered. He had the ap-
pearance of contemplating a great and irremed-
iable tragedy. His melancholy immobility
rasped the other's nerves, so that he fluttered the
papers under his hands noisily, scraped the un-
carpeted floor with restless feet, betraying his
dislike of the depressing, unproductive silence.
The minutes ticked away. From the main
room of the station house came the thumping
sound of several men's feet, the hoarse murmur
of voices in short, jerky questions and answers
— the story, in echoes, of a patrolman “docket-
ing ” some offender. Darden stretched his arms
above his head, moved his shoulders restfully,
relapsed into his brooding meditation. The cap-
117


118 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
tain turned hopefully toward him, started to
speak, went back to his records.
At last Nash threw down his pen and, clear-
ing his throat, broke the silence.
“I can’t get over the way you handled that
man and woman last night—seemed sorry for
'em ! »y
He pronounced the criticism in an uncertain
way, as if he feared to offend Darden. The de-
tective threw off his abstraction immediately,
giving to the policeman a genial attention, with
a smile that spread from his lips upward until
it seemed to touch and come into conflict with
the unchanging sadness of his eyes.
“Perhaps, I was,” he said. “Besides, what
good would it have done if I’d acted differently?
What proofs would we have secured in addition
to those we have now?”
“Proofs?” Nash echoed.
“Yes, proofs. This thing, Captain Nash, has
got to be proved by word of mouth. Particu-
larly, the theft. We have no material or cir-
cumstance proofs on that. You see?”
“Yes; but how will you get that?”
Darden lit a cigarette. “I’ll tell you,” he
said, without excitement, speaking rather in a
detached, judicial manner, as if he related a pro-
gram which he had gone over so often in his


DARDEN PLANS HIS CAMPAIGN 119
mind that it no longer had the power to rouse
his imagination.
“It’s this way,” he explained, through the
smoke that hung, in the close, steam-heated room,
like a grey globe around his head: “I’m con-
vinced that those two woman had something to
do with Revis' past — knew about him. Facts
are all right, Captain, in this sort of work, but,
without the quickening and creative help of feel-
ing, impressions — hunches, if you like — they're
rotten timber. Now, I’m convinced — I feel —
that I’m right about those women.
“I felt it when I talked to them yesterday
morning. I get things that way. It's as if I had
been equipped, from birth, with little jimmies
that pry into others’ feelings. I pick the lock of
their emotions as a cracksman picks the locks of
doors. At least, I think I do.”
He put back his head to blow a long, thin tower
of smoke through the top of the globe that had
not yet entirely dissolved.
“And,” he concluded, “since I’m convinced
they’ve the knowledge that will do away with all
this mystery, I'm going to get it — from one or
the other.”
« HOW 2 » *
“Picture this: these two women carrying the
burden of a criminal secret — perhaps, two se-


DARDEN PLANS HIS CAMPAIGN 121
coat-pocket Mary Haskell's revolver and handed
it to Nash.
“I feel a contempt for myself,” he explained,
“when I employ backstairs methods — servants.”
Nash looked at him open-mouthed.
“You do! Well, I'm blamed if I do! Get
'em, no matter how ! — that's my motto.”
“I suppose so. But I don’t like it. This girl,
Lizzie Wilson, the servant in that apartment,
brought me the revolver an hour ago,” he sighed;
he might have been repenting the use of marked
cards in a game of whist. “Servants,” he made
pensive, deriding comment, “are, after all, the
true historians of every home. They know ev-
erything that happens within those four walls —
they size up people, see the building up or the
disintegration of character — the changes —
they miss nothing. Lizzie demonstrated that to
ine —”
“It’s been fired lately!” Nash broke in ex-
citedly, having concluded his examination of the
revolver. “And only the one shell empty.” He
laid the weapon on his desk. “By George!” he
said, in sincere relief. “By George! That's
lucky for us!”
He glanced at the clock on the wall opposite
the desk. Both he and Darden had the aspect
of waiting. Having discussed every fact con-
nected with this case which made them co-work-


122 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
ers, they sat prepared, at the coming of another
man, to resume their search for enlightenment.
Literal and prosaic as he was, the police cap-
tain's imagination rose to Darden's personality.
He had seen this man last night alert, authorita-
tive, his brain so reliable that his very impulses
were finished plans, his power so evident that he
compelled instant obedience. But now he
lounged in his chair, apparently engrossed in
saddening memories, or roused himself only suf-
ficiently to utter a few explanatory sentences, his
words like dull instruments with which he thrust
weakly and carelessly at the openings presented
to his consideration by the unwisdom of the peo-
ple under suspicion.
He recalled a remark Darden had made last
night: “We’ll get the man who did this thing.
Don’t worry about that. But what I want to
make sure is that we don’t crucify anybody who's
innocent. I’ve a rule that may seem queer to
you —” this with a smile which, although it ex-
pressed no gaiety, had appealed to Nash — that
is, I never like to wind up a case without feeling
that, in handling it, I’ve made at least one new
friend.”
The policeman's failure to understand the de-
tective somehow increased his confidence in him.
Without him, Nash would have felt lost, par-


DARDEN PLANS HIS CAMPAIGN 123
ticularly since Darden had ordered affairs so far.
Nash had a new access of irritability. What was
the matter with the guy anyhow? ..Why this
lazy, deadened attitude? With all his gumption,
why didn’t he put some “pep and snap ’’ into
the work? He muttered discontentedly, making
a clucking noise with his tongue against the roof
of his mouth. A moment later he swore, giving
the oath a vicious sound.
“Why don’t that fool doctor come on?” he
growled.
“I asked you to let Miss Haskell get out of
the house unobserved,” Darden spoke at last, his
tone conveying the impression that he thought
an apology due the policeman, “because I had no
idea she'd done the shooting.”
“But, now?”
“Still I’m not certain.—Could Malloy have
passed that revolver to her when I was at the
bedside, examining Revis’ wound? It's a possi-
bility.” He soliloquized, answering his own in-
quiries. “Or could they have met previously,
in the grounds or the house? Again, a possi-
bility.”
He, in his turn, looked at the wall clock.
“What time did he say he'd get here?” he
asked, dragging his words like a man suddenly
bored.


124 TEIE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
“Time he was here now,” Nash answered, and
kept the talk going. “The guy who can solve
this problem is a wonder, ain’t he?”
“I think,” Darden said, indifferent, “I’ve
solved it. That is, I’ve imagined it.”
“Who did it, then?”
“I mean the theft. You're interested in the
murder. That's the way we planned it, isn’t it?
When we do act, you get all credit for finding the
murderer — I for uncovering the theft. That's
it, isn't it?”
“Yes, sir. And I’ll stick to it.”
“All right, Nash.” He bent upon the police-
man a swift, keen look. “It’s agreed. You'll
give me four or five more days — time to exhaust
the women's strength? No hitch about it?”
“No, sir. But the chief's getting fidgety —
thinks I’ve dug up mighty little.”
Darden yawned. “All right. Let him do bet-
ter — if he can.”
They both looked at the clock again. This
time Darden shared the captain's impatience.
“The senator,” Nash began again, “is the only
person in this world who knows that he had that
confidential information in his coat pocket a week
ago last night.”
“You’ve thought of that?”
“Yes, sir! And I guess you have, too. Be-
ing a an in high place, his word ain’t


DARDEN PLANS HIS CAMPAIGN 125
doubted—” He paused, uncertain of the sound-
ness of his reasoning and added: “– is it?”
“What do you mean?” Darden encouraged
him.
“Nothing much,” Nash said, with a depreca-
tory laugh. “There might be some to say, if
he never had the paper in his pocket, he was the
only man who could have let that information
get out. And, if that's true, he might have had
dealings with Revis — or Revis’ representative
— and, in the end, he might have killed Revis.
Ever think of that, in figuring the theft end of
this?”
“Oh, yes,” Darden said contemptuously,
throwing away his cigarette, “but I don’t believe
a word of it.” He brushed ashes from his coat
sleeve. “What did the Patton girl tell you,
Nash? Exactly what was that, the words Revis
used?” -
Nash coughed, upset by that abrupt dismissal
of his theorizing. “She said this,” he retorted:
“‘Revis said, “Before tonight's over, I’ll know
what Grimes Buckner knows.” ” Those were her
exact words. I made her repeat them several
times.”
“And you believe Revis said that?”
“I believe so — yes.”
“But you'll let me question Buckner on it?”
Darden reminded him of their previous agree-


126 THE UNLIGHTED BIOUSE
ment. “You’ll wait until I'm ready to put it to
him?”
The policeman renewed his promise, and, re-
plying to further questions, declared his cer-
tainty that Lucy Patton had given this informa-
tion to nobody else. She had had sense enough
to keep it from the newspapers.
“Later,” Darden said musingly, “I’m going
to have a heart-to-heart talk with Miss Lucy
Patton.” -
“The coroner didn't summon her for the in-
quest. Wrong there, I thought. But you know
him — he's got his way.— Going to the inquest?
Four this afternoon.”
“No. It'll result in nothing new.”
“Not as much as we know now.”
Darden got up and faced the policeman across
the desk.
“Now, Nash,” he said, with all the authori-
tativeness the captain had observed in him the
night before, “let me sketch our situation once
more.—On the one hand, according to the facts
now, Miss Haskell or Malloy may be guilty, and,
equally probable, he may know her guilt and
be shielding her, or she may know his and be
shielding him.— That right?”
“Correct.”
“On the other hand, is the possibility that
Buckner's mixed up in the thing, may have done


DARDEN PLANS HIS CAMPAIGN 127
the shooting, and the similar possibility that
Lucy Patton may have done the shooting and
wants to throw suspicion on Buckner.—That
right?”
“Correct again.”
“And an arrest last night wouldn't have
brought out the evidence we need, couldn’t have
brought it out — could it?” -
“No, sir,” Nash agreed, on a note of admira-
tion. “You were right there, Mr. Darden. I’m
glad you persuaded me.”
Darden made his point good:
“And no more would an arrest now give us
the proofs we want — would it?”
“Not by a jugfull!”
“So, Nash, you’ll keep the bargain?” Darden
pinned him down. “No matter how the news-
papers clamour for an arrest, no matter how the
chief fumes, I’m to have the four or five days
necessary to handle those women? — That
right?”
The policeman was emphatic in his assent.
“All right. I’ll count on you, Nash. It's the
only way to avoid arresting the wrong man — or
woman — to avoid hanging the wrong man — or
woman.”
The man they were waiting for knocked on the
door. In response to the captain's hail, Dr. Fel-
ton walked in.


128 "THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
“I want to ask you one question,” the detec-
tive explained.
Felton, a small, neutral sort of a man with a
flat, colorless voice, announced his willingness
to answer.
“It's this: when you told the newspaper re-
porters that the person running from Revis’ base-
ment last night might have been a man, were
you really in doubt about it?”
The doctor hesitated.
“Or,” Darden put it quickly, “isn't it your
opinion now that the person was a woman? And
didn't you think, when you saw her last night,
that it was the Patton woman? And, although
you still think it was the Patton woman, aren't
you creating the man probability, simply be-
cause you're averse to doing her the tremendous
injury of putting that suspicion of her into
print?”
Felton forced a laugh that narrowly escaped
the sound of squeakiness.
“Say!” he began uncertainly. “There's
something in that, of course — you know. That
is, I wouldn't want to injure her. You might
put it this way —”
“Excuse me,” Darden interrupted; “but is
what you're about to say your real opinion, no
speculation?”
Felton reflected.


DARDEN PLANS HIS CAMPAIGN 129
“Yes,” he said then, “my real opinion. Hav-
ing seen her go into and out of the house on sev-
eral occasions, I naturally thought of her when
I saw that woman running.”
“And you didn’t think it was a belated maid?”
“Not until afterwards — no.”
“You say you naturally thought of her.
Why? »
“She has light hair. I thought that fleeing
woman had light hair. That's all, I guess.”
“Thank you, doctor,” Darden said cordially.
“That's all — except this, just to be sure: you
wouldn't swear now that that woman was Lucy
Patton, would you?”
“No, sir – I would not!” said the doctor, with
emphasis.
“But you're sure it wasn't a man?”
“Absolutely sure of that—yes.”
Darden left the station house with a feeling
that approached elation. Using the appoint-
ment with Felton as excuse for spending that
long hour of gossip in Nash's office, he had as-
sured himself of that official's fair and unques-
tioning co-operation without revealing his own
absolute dependence on the alliance. Expe-
rience had taught him the value of assuming, in
a matter of divided authority, an independent if
not an indifferent attitude. And this time it had
served his purpose. He could proceed with the


XIII
THE SENATOR ADVISES
TICKNER'S solicitous comment on Mary's
exhausted appearance made confession
more difficult even than she had ex-
pected. Distrusting Darden, dwelling morbidly
on the probable results of the senator's hearing
the story from anybody but herself, she had de-
termined to tell him of last night's adventure.
Fear of Darden had reduced Grimes Buckner's
disapproval to nothing more than a minor dis-
comfiture. And, having reached the decision,
she had watched with feverish eagerness for his
coming.
To have it over! When that was done, her im-
agination would give her peace!
She had intended to treat the incident lightly.
Her gaiety should rob it of significance. She
would make him laugh with her, would treat as a
lover's joke the necessity she felt of asking his
forgiveness for bumping her silly head into the
tragedy of crime.
Now, however, she could not speak the appro-
priate lines. The rôle which had seemed so easy
to fill defied her resourcefulness of thought and
131


132 - THE UNLIGHTED EIOUSE
feeling. The play would not begin. Instead of
cajolery and a laughing pretence of timidity, her
voice informed him of her enormous agitation,
her face paraded multiple signs of the anguish
she had endured. A ruinous stage-fright par-
alysed her purpose.
“What is it, Mary? What troubles you?”
His bass voice, an endearing rumble, was col-
oured by the lover's egoistic confidence of ability
to console.
“I’ve something to tell you.”
She was horrified by the awe in her words;
each one of them fell from her lips heavily, as if
it had been uttered only by a supreme effort.
She had been standing beside his chair, looking
down into his upturned face. Now, as she spoke,
she turned away from him, took a seat that put
the table between them.
“Is it so bad?” he asked, with a short laugh.
She gave him the fact with breathless direct-
IneSS :
“I narrowly escaped being connected with
that —” She stopped, long enough to move her
lips one against the other. “– that Revis mur-
der — in the newspapers.”
“What!” He leaned forward suddenly,
thumping his elbows on the table, the thatch of
his shaggy eyebrows drawn far down over his
eyes. “What's that?”
-


THE SENATOR ADVISES 133
She was in a chair so low that the table edge
cut off his view of her at the neck. He might
have been looking at a marble bust hung in
space, a statuette of woe.
“I had nothing to do with the murder,” she
said as promptly as she could.
“Oh, I see.” His short laugh this time was
one of relief. His features looked less thick, al-
though they were still flushed. He moved his
shoulders jerkily, like the act of throwing off a
burden. “I see. For a moment you startled
me — actually.” He seemed ashamed of his ex-
citement.
She succeeded fairly with a laughing remon-
strance: “You didn't think I killed him '''
He rested his chin on his hands and gave her
a look keen and suspicious.
“I’ll tell you, Mary,” he said solemnly. “That
fellow Darden had an idea, when he talked to me
Saturday, that you and Addie Colvin, or one of
you anyway, knew something about Revis’ past.
He didn't say so, in so many words, but that was
his idea. I saw it. And the minute you said
you'd been in danger of being mixed up with his
murder, I thought of that.”
She waved her hands. They came up from un-
der the table and wavered whitely on each side
of her with a curious effect, as if they had little
connection with her body. He had the impres-


134 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
sion of dealing with two individuals across the
table from him.
“Let me tell you about it, Grimes,” she sug-
gested, more like her normal self. “It isn't so
bad, so very bad.”
“Tell me.”
She repeated the story she had told Darden in
Revis’ bedroom — her walk as a relief from ner-
vousness — her curiosity her only motive for the
reckless act — and added:
“Don’t condemn me, Grimes. It was a fool-
ish, inexcusable thing to do. I know that. But
even the detective protected me. He wouldn't
subject me to notoriety. It has all come out sat-
isfactorily.— Hasn’t it?”
“Has it?” he objected in a tone that was al-
most a growl. “Think a minute, Maryl Revis
was suspected of trying to engineer the theft of
confidential information that had been intrusted
to me. One of your admirers, Tom Malloy, is
found in the murdered man's room — is virtually
charged with the crime. And it is that room that
you stumble into as the result of a crazy out-
burst of curiosity' "
He stood up, his bulk rising above the table
mountainous and threatening.
“Of course, I don't doubt you, Mary — not for
a minute. But to the man in the street it would
look thin — thin as —” He checked himself and


THE SENATOR ADVISES 135
struck the table a blow that made it crack. “I
tell you, Mary, I'd rather see you dead than asso-
ciated with such a man, such a scandal!”
“Oh, Grimes!” Her outcry was against the
look of his swollen features, rather than what he
said.
“And I’ll tell you another thing,” he swept on,
booming out his words: “I believe Addie Col-
vin knew that man! I believe, if you let her
hang around you, she'll get you into trouble. If
you’ve the slightest suspicion that she ever had
anything to do with him, put her out of this
apartment, cut away from her! I don't want
my wife identified with any such person l’’
She tried to placate him. “But, Grimes,
there's nothing to give even a shadow of likeli-
hood to what you say!”
“Why did Darden come up here to question
her, then?”
“But he questioned me, too.”
“A bluff — that part of it! He was after the
Colvin woman.”
“I’m sure you're mistaken,” she insisted.
“Besides, why be angry with Addie simply be-
cause my folly took me into that room?”
He sat down, doubt still flaming in his eyes.
“All the same, I don't like it!”
She made, then, her greatest effort, the decid-
ing test. She sprang up and, going around the


136 TEIE UNLIGHTED ELOUSE
table, leaned against his shoulder, running caress-
ing fingers through his hair.
“Old goosey!” she chided, laughing endear-
ingly, wooing him with touch and voice. “You
say all that just because you don't like Addie
anyway. Suppose — just suppose I had known
him — I myself. Would you hate me so?”
He took her hand, holding it while he looked
up in scowling reproof. Z
“That's foolery!” he said hotly. “Assuming
that you had known such a man, that he had
come to Washington and renewed his acquaint-
ance with you — Well, I think you'd soon break
your engagement to marry me.— I don't like to
talk of such things in connection with you.
That wouldn't be you — not the Mary Haskell I
know. It would be a woman I’d be ashamed to
be seen with in public.”
She went cold throughout her body. That set-
tled it — for ever! Whatever happened, she
would never have the courage to tell him the
story as Tom Malloy had urged her to do. She
went back to her place across the table.
“You’re not a trusting, trustful man, are
you?” she said lightly.
Without replying to that, he put his hand into
one of his coat pockets.
“By the way,” he said, “I forgot to return this
to you.”


THE SENATOR ADVISES 137
His tone was not yet altogether pleasant. It
had the sullen note that lingers in the stubborn
man's voice when he tries to change from anger
to good nature.
He handed her a gold glove-buttoner, a dupli-
cate of her own. Her jaw dropped. She could
not conceal her astonishment.
“What's the matter?” he asked sharply.
“Nothing,” she said. “I — I thought I'd lost
it. That's all.”
He was suspicious again.
“Thought you lost it? Where?”
“What a question!” she cried, her voice break-
ing. “I didn't know where I’d lost it.”
A pause followed, grew painfully long. The
only sound was his heavy breathing as he looked
at her. Conscious of his gaze, she sat with eyes
downcast, revolving in her mind another prob-
lem that she could not solve. If she warned him
of Darden's discovery of the other buttoner, he
would go to the detective at once, demanding
explanation. Unable to endure that idea, she
consoled herself with her conviction that to sus-
pect Grimes of any connection with Revis would
be absurd. Even Darden had ridiculed such a
Suspicion.
In a flash of clearer insight she realized how
inevitably her first deceit created, in each new
difficulty, the necessity for additional deceptions.


138 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
She allayed her uneasiness again, this time with
the thought that Grimes was in no danger. She
must say nothing, because to speak would be,
perhaps, to give rise to danger. -
He had reached his decision.
“Well, I'll tell you,” he said, obviously strain-
ing for an effect of jocularity. “I had intended
a harmless little joke. Instead of your having
lost it, the fact is I’d lost it; and, as I’d given
you the original, I didn't feel — for sentimental
reasons — like telling you of the loss. So I got
this, exactly like the other, this morning. You
don’t mind, do you?”
She began to cry. “Oh, Grimes, you're too
good to me!”
He neither admitted nor denied that. When
she looked up, drying her eyes with little dabs of
her handkerchief, he forced a laugh. *
“This doesn’t seem to be our big day, does
it?”
“No,” she said pitifully. “I’m all to pieces,
Grimes. I’ve worried all night about that—
that awful experience. I knew you wouldn't
approve; and yet, I had to tell you.”
“It was the only thing to do.”
“I — we both owe a great deal to Mr. Dar-
den,” she reminded him anxiously. “He
risked a lot to protect me so. And he asked me


THE SENATOR ADVISES 139
to say nothing about it. You won’t go to him
about it, will you? Will you, Grimes?”
“Suppose I did?”
“It might provoke him — into giving the story
to the reporters.”
He frowned heavily. “It might, indeed!”
He drummed the table with his knuckles, and
moved impatiently. “Confound it all!” he
growled. “But, as I understand it, you're-well
out of this thing. So far as police and news-
papers are concerned, it is as if you'd never
seen that house, that body of the murdered man.
Is that true?”
“Yes; it is.”
“And Malloy? You think he killed Revis?”
“No!” she said with energy. “No!”
He mused again, fingers rasping his close-
shaven chin, watching her through the edges of
his lowered brows.
“All the same,” he advised, in a tone that
amounted to command, “I wouldn't have any-
thing to do with him now.”
“Why?” She could not suppress her indig-
nation.
“Because he's a marked man. If you permit
him to come here as he's been doing, you'll be
written up as his friend, sympathizer. That will
get you into the papers just as surely as your


140 TEIE UNLIGHTED BIOUSE
presence in that house last night would have
done it, but for Darden.”
She was evasive.
“I’m sure Tom would do nothing to embarrass
me.”
“You are?” He was sarcastic.
“You see yourself, Grimes — he hasn’t been
here today, hasn't even telephoned.”
“You told him yesterday you'd accepted me —
our engagement? Did you?”
44 Yes.”
“Then, I don't suppose he'll bother you!”
He laughed his assurance, a feeling of superior-
ity, and of possession.
“No; I guess not.” She tried to smile, failed,
covered the failure with an imitation of absent-
minded pursing of the lips.
“Then, it's all right, my dear.” He in his
turn circled the table, to bend over her, his man-
ner affectionate and free of uneasiness, so far
as she could see. “You have nothing more to
worry about. But I want mother to meet you
in a day or two, you've got to look your best.
Can't you get some rest and sleep? You're pale
as a ghost?”
“Yes; I must.”
But, left alone, she sank into black depression.
His scowling reproof, answering that question
of hers, “Would you hate me if I had known


TEIE SENATOR ADVISES 141
him?” demoralized her. He had closed the door
on even the possibility of her confession. And
Tom had said that he would tell him if she did
not. But Tom had problems of his own to deal
with now. He would not carry out his threat.
She thought again of the line in her diary:
“The past is dead, gone. It has not even a
ghost.” And here it was, a tremendous agent,
alive, powerful, hanging manacles upon her
hands, putting fetters upon her stumbling feet!
But, she reflected, she had fought it successfully.
Grimes still loved her. Not even Darden could
turn him against her now. She had seen to that.
The gold glove-buttoner, lying on the table,
caught her eye. She shuddered, seeing again
her own, the one Darden had found “at the far
side of Revis’ bed.” And yet, Grimes had ex-
plained his buying another. He had intended to
make that explanation, even if she had not com-
pelled it by her astonishment. She was sure
he had. Yes — he had *
“Now,” she decided, “I’ve done all I can think
of. Everything's arranged. I’m safe. I've
guarded against every contingency. I can
sleep.”
A noise in the hall, a light and furtive foot-
fall, attracted her attention. She turned in that
direction. The next moment Tom Malloy stood
in the living-room doorway, smiling.


XIV
THE DETERMINING FACTOR
E came toward her with a swift, gliding
H step, arms hanging loosely, face thrust
forward from stooping shoulders, as if
he made tremendous and absorbing effort to read
in her face the nature of his welcome. His smile
was fixed, unchanging, his lightly parted lips un-
moved by his quick, shallow breathing.
“Sit down, Tom,” she said wearily, when he
stood a few feet from her.
“I haven't much time, Mary!”
Still in the grip of an anxious curiosity, he
sat on the arm of a chair close to hers — his atti-
tude unsettled and, as it were, tentative, indicat-
ing a lingering doubt of her tolerance and at
the same time a readiness to spring to his feet.
Their looks met and held, each expressing the
same wariness, the same doubtful questioning,
the same aversion to being answered. It was
like a reciprocal warning not to say too much.
Her glance was the first to fall.
She was vaguely alarmed, observing that he
seemed harassed. His eyes had lost their lucid-
ity; his face was heavily lined at the corners of
142


THE DETERMINING FACTOR 143
his eyes. Although he threw over his shoulder
but one inquisitive, uneasy look, his manner sug-
gested a constant alertness, a disturbed expect-
ancy.
“You came in so quietly l’” she said.
“It would do you no good to be associated
with me,” he began a hasty explanation. “I’m
under arrest, you know. Any little turn of
events might couple your name with mine — in
the newspapers. And that might mean trouble!
I came up by the steps. At a certain angle, one
of the wings of the revolving door at the lobby
entrance reflects to you, when you’re standing
outside, the elevator door. I saw by that when
the elevator was up. I avoided the telephone
booth, too. Nobody saw me come in.— Now,
what have you done, Mary? What have you said
to Darden and the rest of them?”
“Nothing,” she said in a dull, listless tone;
“absolutely nothing.”
“Good!” he approved. “Fine, Mary! I
came here to advise that very thing. Say noth-
ing — for ever — to everybody — no matter what
pressure they try to put on you. So long as
you’re silent, we're — everything's right as a
triyet.” -
He stood up, and continued, his words col-
oured now and then, in spite of his nervous hurry,
by a faint suggestion of the surface merriment,


THE DETERMINING FACTOR 145
that shook him. She lay back in the chair, the
closed lids of her eyes tremulous, the fingers of
her other untensed hand in her lap twitching
spasmodically, one at a time and at frequent, ir-
regular intervals.
“What is it, Mary?”
She sat erect again and spoke with a force
that seemed, in her, downright violence:
“Nobody would call his death a crime — if
the facts were known ”
He agreed to that through gritted teeth:
« NO.”
There was another pause.
“He cumbered the earth,” she said, in fierce
disgust, “like a horrible growth, or like the
fumes of death, like — like carrion' "
“Carrion of the soul,” he said.
She leaned closer to him, her eyes hot, burning.
“I’m not sorry it hap — not sorry he's dead.”
He caught her hand up swiftly, and gave her a
quick, warning look.
“Don’t l” he commanded, sympathy and im-
periousness mingling in his voice. “Never say
that again, Mary!” He threw over his shoulder
a searching look. “Never!”
She laughed, a deadened sound that was
neither mirth nor fear.
“I wouldn't, to anybody but you.- You under-
stand.”


146 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
“Not even to me!” he corrected her. “Par-
ticularly not to me!”
Her smile gave him the impression that she
humoured but did not understand his cautious-
ness. He bent down and put his hand on hers,
giving it a reassuring pressure. He took two
steps toward the door, swung back to her.
“That promise yesterday, Mary, that you'd
tell Buckner about that — that incident — don’t
bother about it. Tell him when the time's pro-
pitious. Choose your opportunity when you
please. You have nothing to fear from me. I’ll
say nothing to him.”
Instead of replying to that, she asked him a
question, slipping forward to the edge of her
chair, pitching her voice scarcely above a whis-
per, her eyes wide. *
“Tom, why did you go back into that house?”
He stomped his foot, struck the open palm of
his left hand with the fist of his right.
“I didn't, Mary! — And you didn't!”
He looked at her with imploring eyes.
“You’ll remember that — no matter what hap-
pens? No matter who says I did? No matter
who says you did? You'll remember?”
“I’ve told you that. I said I’d say nothing
to anybody — but you.”
“Not even to me,” he repeated; and, after a
pause in which he reflected, he added: “Put


148 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
In that way, in that way alone, I shall know al-
ways what to do — and your happiness be above
attack.”
He put out his hand, twisting it in midair, a
gesture destroying every menace, and, smiling
again, left her.
She reviewed what he had said, his feverish
warning that by talking she would injure both
him and herself. That was the determining
factor — it decided everything for her! She
would debate no further. If he was safe, she
could carry out the policy of silence on which
she had decided that morning.
At first sight of him, she had realized, with
sharp self-reproach, that she had adopted it with-
out considering sufficiently his welfare, his fate,
thinking of her own ends. Now, he approved
what she had done, at the same time assuring
her of the impossibility of the police fastening
the crime upon him.
Thinking of this, she put from her, definitely
and finally, her last idea, her last fear, of ever
breaking her silence, of ever telling anybody any-
thing. She would go on “for ever — to every-
body,” as he had advised her — saying nothing,
defying the police to prove anything that might
hurt her.
She felt a restful and gratifying relief, reveled


THE DETERMINING FACTOR 149
in her sensation of safety. The path lay open
and straight ahead of her, and she had no fear
of straying from it.
She had no fear even of George Darden.


XV
AN INTERESTING PEIOTOGRAPH
ARDEN realized that, if there was to
be no police action in the case during
the next four or five days, it was essen-
tial that there be no further revelations bearing
on the problem, no developments on which press
and public might base a demand for arrests.
Such disclosures might be made by either Miss
Lucy Patton or Señor Altillero, neither of whom,
he felt sure, had been entirely frank with the
police. Both of them, therefore, must be warned
to say nothing more, must be persuaded that their
own interests would be served best by secretive-
IneSS.
Setting out to take the necessary precautions,
the detective began with the simpler task. He
found the Latin-American in the parlour of his
hotel suite.
“It would be, I believe,” he remarked in his
most engaging manner, “embarrassing to both
you and the people you represent to be pictured
as having countenanced a low and despicable in-
trigue.”
44 Yes? »
- 150


152 THE UNLIGHTED BIOUSE
mation that his departure would be highly and
at once, appreciated.”
“Nevertheless,” Darden insisted, “you recog-
nize the advisability of your not repeating it to
the newspapers, as you did to Captain Nash?—
Good! — Now, I’ll make you a guarantee. If
you say nothing about it, again, mention it to
nobody, I’ll protect you when the case comes to
trial. I’ll keep your name out of it, make it
appear certain that you had no relationship with
Revis. That do?”
Altillero lit a cigarette, to take time to decide
that this was what he wanted. “It is most
kind,” he agreed finally, lips smiling, eyes crafty.
“Now, señor,” said Darden, immediately more
confidential, much more friendly; “now that we
understand each other, you'll assist me a little,
I’m sure. From Revis' manner and his other re-
marks — at the door, of course, in the moment
when you were expediting his egress — did you
conclude anything about that woman's foolish-
ness?”
Altillero smoked prodigiously, looking incom-
parably blank.
“I mean: did you think the foolishness had
been committed in the past, and she would now
be compelled to pay for it? Or was her folly a
thing of the present, an actual or imagined weak-
ness for Revis, of which he could make use? Or,


AN INTERESTING PEIOTOGRAPH 153
finally, did he think her so foolish that he was
sure he could make her do whatever he com-
manded, at any time in the future?”
Altillero's blankness persisted.
“Just between us, señor — remembering, of
course, my promise to protect you.”
“Ah, Mr. Dar-denn' I grasp the point now !”
Altillero grinned slyly. “And you understand,
I see, the difficulty I must have had in drawing
any such conclusions in that brief moment, at the
door.” He clapped his pudgy hands and
laughed, rolling from side to side. “You under-
stand? Only at the door he talked about the
woman. Well! I should guess it was a woman
he had had under his control in the past—
threats — yes? Like this.” He opened and
slowly closed the fingers of his right hand, the
motion of squeezing something into nothingness.
“He had her — what do you say? — where he
wanted her when he chose to put on the pres-
sure.”
“And that was Sunday, yesterday?”
“Yes, at noon, soon after my late breakfast.”
“Had he ever made that statement before that
— previous to yesterday?”
Altillero frowned again, smiled afterwards,
and explained: “You forget, Mr. Dar-denn!
He only said that once — in the moment at the
door — yesterday.”


154 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
It was after six o'clock when, without the for-
mality of sending up his card, Darden rang the
bell of Lucy Patton's N Street apartment. She
opened the door wide and waited for him to an-
nounce himself.
“Miss Patton, my name is Darden; I'm a de-
tective,” he began, with a look that conveyed to
her a surprised admiration. “May I come in?”
“Oh, I suppose so!” She stepped aside, mak-
ing room for his entrance. “The more the mer-
rier, I guess.” She closed the door. “Go into
the living room there — that door.”
She followed him in and sat down on a couch
piled high with silk-covered cushions of many
colours. He observed what he thought was a
peculiar awkwardness of movement when she
took her seat. He noticed, also, the loose-jointed,
sprawly way she leaned to one side, her elbow
cutting deep into the cushions. That led him to
closer scrutiny of her features, which were
flushed, her eyes of an artificial brightness and
restlessness.
“Now, what?” she inquired, intending to
smile, but succeeding in nothing better than the
appearance of a vacuous grin.
He was no longer in doubt. Miss Patton had
resorted to alcoholic stimulation as a means of
withstanding the day's horde of police investi-


AN INTERESTING PHOTOGRAPH 155.
gators and newspaper correspondents. More
than that, she had used the stimulant to excess.
She was, he judged, in that condition which
brings the universe into unison with one's
thoughts, makes it easy to know that one's own
opinion is the final factor — in everything.
He congratulated her on having told nobody
but Nash of the remark that Revis had made
about Grimes Buckner, on having thus made it
certain that the newspapers would not get pos-
session of it. -
“I wasn't born yesterday, Mr. Darden,” she
said with complacency. “And I know my Wash-
ington.” She made a grimace of contempt.
“Washington' "
“Yes; Washington,” he humoured her, hoping
that she would continue.
“And what it does to a woman like that.”
He put his query blindly:
“You mean the woman Revis was talking
about?”
“Why, yes! Who else?” Her mood had
changed to solemnity, almost sorrow. She was
more affected by the alcohol than he had sus-
pected. “I felt sorry for her. Really, I did.”
She said that with tremendous emphasis, as if
she felt impelled to assure him beyond doubt of
her sympathy for the other woman. “And I


156 THE UNLIGHTED EIOUSE
knew, if I said anything about her, the papers
would give her the worst of it, and the gossips
would. That's Washington.”
She paused, looking at him with an exagger-
ated expression of grief, her eyes winking rapidly.
He used the only fact Nash had given him, the
only fact he had :
“Mr. Revis said that before the night was over
he'd know what Grimes Buckner knew — didn't
he 2 º’
She started upright, brushing a hand across
her forehead.
“Sure, he said that! I told the police captain
– Nash was his name, you know — told him that.
But I didn't say anything about the woman.”
Darden restrained his eager interest. This
good fortune seemed to him incredible. There
was a possibility that he would hear the other
woman's name.”
“Why were you so sorry for her?” he ven-
tured, assuming himself the look and tone of sym-
pathy.
She laughed contemptuously. “Oh, I don't
know! I knew so well what she was like, I guess.
The town's full of them.” She bent toward him,
changing her mood again, this time to a confiden-
tial, trusting friendliness. “I’m tired out!
This day's been something awful. And, if you
don't mind – perhaps, you'll join me — I’m go-


AN INTERESTING PHOTOGRAPH 157
ing to have a little pick-me-up. I managed to
keep a little here — medicine.” She stood up,
“will you?”
“Thanks; certainly. May I get it for you?”
She brought a tray from the diningroom, which
was little more than an alcove, opening off the
room they were in.
“I don't know why it is,” she said, “but I
know I can trust you. Yes, I know why it is!”
She was on the couch now, sipping the drink.
“You understand women. No man with eyes
like yours but understands women — and has
paid for the knowledge. That's why I'm telling
you about her, the woman I felt so sorry for. I
don't know why I did exactly, unless it was the
way Ed. Revis looked when he said that.”
Darden finished his drink and set the glass on
the tray, on the table at his elbow, before he nºr-
mitted himself to ask her, with a show of nothing
more than polite interest:
“When he said what, Miss Patton?”
She put back the loose hair falling over her
forehead.
“He said — his exact words: “Before to-
night's over I'll know what Grimes Buckner
knows, and all because of a woman's foolishness.’
But it was his gloating look that made me sorry
for her, and the motion he made with his hand,
that big, coarse fist he had, like this.” She dupli-


158 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
cated the imitation that Altillero had given of
Revis' gesture of putting on the pressure. “It
looked, it was, the last thing in brutality, Mr.
Darden. No wonder I was sorry for her — in
that man's power! I could see her driven to do
some awful thing, pick a pocket, perhaps, or rifle
a desk, or steal — mortgage her soul to ruin all
over again — because of some little slip she had
made, some little mistake in her past, something
that he held over her, whipping her to his pur-
pose!”
She covered her face a moment with her hands,
as if moved beyond control by her thoughts of
that other woman's wretchedness.
“Who was she?” he felt safe in asking now.
“What was her name, Miss Patton?”
“Oh,” she said, with a laugh blank of all ex-
pression, “he wasn't fool enough to tell me that.
He wouldn’t have said anything at all if he hadn't
been drinking too much. But, at that, he knew
enough to keep her name out of it.” She looked
up with owlish wisdom. “That might have put
him in my power, you know. And that isn't
their —” She took a long breath, with difficulty,
and struck her chest sharply twice. “– isn't
their game. Their game is to wind the woman
around their finger, not to give her a hold on
them.”
“So you thought, when he spoke of her fool-


AN INTERESTING PEIOTOGRAPH 159
ishness, he meant to use his knowledge of some-
thing in her life to compel her to do what he
Ordered?”
“Yes; I thought that.”
“That is, the folly was of the past — not the
folly of being in love with him now, some woman
so infatuated with him that she'd be foolish
enough to obey him in anything.”
She laughed her sincere ridicule. “No, not
that, Mr. Darden. What woman could have been
infatuated with Ed. Revis?”
“But you liked him — didn't you?” he put in
quickly.
“His entertaining me, yes — him, no.” She
illuminated that with a confession. “That's
Washington again. A woman of thirty, passé,
like myself — thousands of 'em in this town —
what has she?” She answered that with sudden
and surprising gloominess of expression. “A
past that proves the unreliability of men, a pres-
ent that makes you grasp at any man's offer to
vary the boredom of your life, a future from
which you turn away, afraid to look at the empti-
ness that's about to engulf you!” Something
caught in her throat. “A loose and vitiated
atmosphere, this is'
“A girl comes here, one among thousands;
and glitter gives way to loneliness soon enough.
God, what loneliness — of spirit, of mind! A


160 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
man's fancy touches you, lingers, has in it the
promise of permanence. Then, before you know
it, you’ve sold your graces, and held your charm
too cheaply, and put your soul in pawn!” She
stopped to look at him out of eyes that were hard
with a wise pessimism. She smiled, a woebe-
gone fatality, a facial what's-the-difference?
“Washington! A rotten place for a woman like
me — like her!”
She stood up, to put her empty glass on the
tray, took a sliding step to one side, collapsed
suddenly, and fell rather than sat down again on
the couch. He took the glass from among the
cushions where it had fallen. When he turned
back from the table, he saw that she was deadly
pale.
“You’re ill!” he exclaimed. “What can I do
for you?”
She threw out one hand wildly.
“Air!” she said hoarsely. “Open a window.
I can't breathe.”
She lay back on the couch, her eyes closed.
“Isn't there something you take?” he asked,
after he had raised the window sash. “Some-
thing for your heart — ammonia?”
She spoke with difficulty: “Ammonia, in the
bathroom, in the cabinet.”
He went through her bedroom and into the
bath. Seeing a chest of drawers, he pulled open


AN INTERESTING PEIOTOGRAPH 161
the top drawer, and found it packed with linen.
The second disclosed odds and ends of every-
thing, medicine bottles, stockings, old ribbons.
Rummaging in that, he came upon what felt like
a large piece of cardboard, at the back, on a layer
of small bottles. He drew it out, an old photo-
graph, and put it down hurriedly on top of the
chest.
He caught sight then of a little cabinet let into
the wall near the washstand. Opening that, he
found the bottle of ammonia. As he turned, his
eye fell on the photograph. He recognized it —
recognized it with a start which almost made him
drop the bottle, with an astonishment that made
him doubt the reliability of his eyes. He looked
at it again, bending closer to it. He had not been
mistaken. It was a photograph of Senator
Grimes Buckner.


XVI
THE THOROUGH MR. REWIS
T'S nothing; I'll be all right in — in a little
while,” she murmured weakly, putting a
palsied hand to the glass he held to her lips.
When she had taken the diluted ammonia, he sat
beside the couch smoking, waiting for her to re-
gain her strength. To leave her now would be
to risk the loss of information which she alone
could give him, information which she well might
refuse, after reflection, to give him at all.
Discovery of the Buckner photograph was, to
him, the most surprising of all the astonishing
features of this case. Never in his most improb-
able imaginings, his wildest theories, in connec-
tion with Revis' murder, had he suspected any
connection between the senator and the Patton
WOIn all.
His chief surprise was that Buckner should
ever have been an admirer of Lucy Patton or of
any woman like her. Evidently, the friendship
— the intimacy, whatever it was — had been kept
unusually well hidden. He wondered if it still
existed. The engagement to Miss Haskell made
that improbable. Still —
He had seen Miss Colvin again that afternoon.
162


TELE THOROUGH MR. REVIS 163
True to his declared policy of “gentle relentless-
ness” in questioning her and Miss Haskell, he
had joined her as she left the Department of
Agriculture at the close of her day's work and
had walked with her through the grounds to her
street car. His questioning had resulted in no
breakdown of her attitude of the morning, but it
had given him a brief sketch of Buckner's court-
ship of Miss Haskell. -
From it he gathered that, while there had been
no attempt, in fact no wish, on the senator's part
to keep the affair a secret, it had not been widely
known. This had come about quite naturally.
Mary, quick to see that he enjoyed the restful,
quiet evenings in the little apartment, and
greatly attracted by him from the beginning, had
been only too glad to please him by falling into a
routine which embraced few theatre parties and
down-town suppers.
But with Miss Patton, Darden believed, it must
have been a different matter, a different relation-
ship, one which Buckner had not wished to dis-
close at any time to anybody — certainly one
which he would not have wished known after his
engagement to Miss Haskell.
He was conscious at last of her gaze. He
turned, to find her looking at him with sobered
eyes half-hidden by drooping lids. She raised
her head, supporting it with her left hand.


164 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
“Better?” he asked, with an easy smile.
“Yes,” she said, and explained with unex-
pected dignity; “that hasn’t happened to me
often. Once before in my life.”
“It was the strain you’ve been under today,”
he consoled. “No wonder you went under. I
suppose you’ve answered a thousand questions,
haven’t you?”
“At least.”
She put her open palms flat on the cushions
behind her and leaned on them, her straight, stiff
arms pushing her shoulders high up on each side
of her head, the dark stuff of her dress accentu-
ating the dead pallor of her face. She had the
air of peering at him oddly.
He proceeded, then, to tell her of his accidental
discovery of Buckner's photograph. She heard
him through in silence, without change of expres-
sion except that her eyes narrowed, as if she
would guard against his finding anything in
them.
“Now that I’ve seen the photograph,” he con-
cluded, “there are certain things I’ll have to ask
about. It brings up certain ideas.”
“What, for instance?”
“First,” he replied directly, “that Revis might
have hoped to use you, your acquaintance with
the senator, as a means of getting the confidential
information he was after. You know about that,


THE TEIOROUGH MR. REVIS 165
*
don’t you — the facts he wanted to steal and
Sel1?”
She considered a long time.
“Yes,” she admitted at last. “I knew some-
thing about that.”
“So, he did try to use you?” Darden per-
sisted.
&&. Yes.”
“Do you object to telling me how?”
She hesitated again, holding her cramped posi-
tion, studying him with narrowed, unrevealing
eyes.
“I think I'd better tell you,” she decided.
She got up and went around him to the table,
at which she sat down. She put her left elbow
on the table and leaned her head on that hand
while with the other she absent-mindedly took
matches from a tray and, after snapping them in
two, dropped them, one after the other. She
stared at the table, but, even without the anima-
tion of her glance, her features showed the in-
tense, business-like way in which she pondered
the situation. The alcohol no longer bothered
her. He knew that he had to contend now with
her unclouded and serviceable wits.
He swung around in his chair, to face her
squarely. She kept her eyes averted.
“Last Sunday morning — that is, a week ago
yesterday,” she began, “he insisted on my calling
/


166 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
up Senator Buckner and asking him to come to
this apartment late that afternoon.”
“Why?” Darden looked unsurprised.
“He didn't care why; said I could give any
reason that occurred to me — the main and only
thing was to get him here at that hour.”
“I mean, did Revis tell you why he wanted
him here?”
“He said he wanted to ask him a few questions,
and he could do it to better advantage here than
in the formal atmosphere of an office. He said it
related to a matter of great interest to a foreign
government.”
She was silent, the only sound in the room that
of the crackling matches she snapped between
her fingers.
“And,” ventured Darden, “you know the sen-
ator that well? Well enough to invite him here
like that?”
She answered that readily, without looking up:
“I used to. I haven’t seen him for four or five
months. We'd never been very intimate, but at
one time he came in quite often. I think he'd
never seen a woman exactly like me — free and
easy, and yet fairly decent.” She smiled at the
table, deprecating the necessity of the self-de-
fence. “And he’s a man who — one of those
serious rather heavy men who like to be flattered,


THE TEIOROUGH MR. REVIS 167
who like women to tell them how great they are
— and I humoured him in that. But, as I said,
he hadn’t been here for more than four months.”
“And he came yesterday a week ago?”
“No — I didn’t ask him.”
&&. Why? 22
She looked up at last. “Because I hadn’t the
nerve — or an excuse for the request. And I
didn't trust Revis. I don’t know why, but it
sounded “off” to me.”
“And Revis? Did he like that?”
“Oh, no. He flew into a rage, but —”
She waved a hand, dismissing that as of no
importance, and went back to playing with the
matches.
So, thought Darden, Revis had known that
morning — the Sunday a week from yesterday —
that the Secretary of State would give Buckner a
draft of the desired information late that after-
noon. He knew it because his only object in
planning to meet Buckner here would have been
to seek an opportunity for stealing a look at the
draft.
It was an important disclosure. It made it
certain that Buckner, from the time he left the
State Department, must have been under surveil-
lance by Revis or Revis' agents in the hope of
finding the opportunity Miss Patton had failed to


168 THE UNLIGHTED BIOUSE
provide. And Buckner had told him — Darden
— that, before going to Mary Haskell's apart-
ment that evening, he had dined in a down-town
hotel, had hung his overcoat on the back of his
chair rather than trust it to the checker as long
as it contained the draft. The field of theft pos-
sibilities became, under that consideration, limit-
less! —
He went back to Miss Patton:
“You realize that this familiarity with Revis’
plans increases the suspicion that you know some-
thing about his death or his murderer?”
“No; not necessarily,” she said coolly.
He took another direction.
“Just now — I mean, before you fainted —
in all that sympathy for the other woman, Miss
Patton — was it all for her, or, as sometimes
happens in such conditions, mightn't that have
been your way of expressing sympathy for your-
Self?”
She swayed in her chair, looked suddenly star-
tled and met his gaze. He repeated:
“Mightn't you have been talking about your-
self? Sorry for yourself?”
“Why, no!” she said sharply.
“And yet, you said yourself you were like that
WOman.”
“Oh, I see!” She seemed entirely open and
frank. “No. Revis had no hold on me. I’ve


THE TEIOROUGH MER. REVIS 169
just told you he couldn’t make me telephone Sen-
ator Buckner.”
“And couldn’t have made you come to his
house last night?”
“No!” She added to that quickly: “He
didn’t try.”
He insisted: “You were not there, then?”
&&. No.”
“Who, then, was? Do you know? Have you
an idea?”
“There were two women who sometimes went
to that house. Revis told me that. One of them,
I know, he regarded as an assistant in getting the
information he wanted. He said he'd known her
a long time. I’m not certain about the other,
although I suspect he thought he could use her,
too.”
He pressed her for their names, but she knew
nothing more about them. She doubted that
West, the valet, would know. Revis, as a rule,
had been careful about such details, secretive.
How, then, he asked, explain his loose talk of
yesterday about knowing what Buckner knew
and a woman’s “foolishness "? She could not
answer that, except to say that he had been drink-
ing to excess for nearly three weeks — perhaps,
that had lessened his caution.
She added one fact: Revis had said yesterday
to her: “There are two strings to this little


170 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
bow. If I don’t get what I'm after in my way,
maybe it'll be bought. There's big money behind
us.”
“So, Miss Patton,” Darden said, careful to
make his manner free from offence, “you felt that
Revis wasn't altogether straight?”
“Oh, yes,” she admitted, without reluctance;
“He was a crook.”
“And yet, you — you associated with him?”
She made an inimitable gesture, a movement
of shoulders and eyebrows that said distinctly:
“to be too careful in Washington is to decimate
your list of acquaintances!”
He saw again in her eyes the hardness that
looked like a wise and uncomplaining pessimism.
“And you think a woman killed Revis?” he
asked.
“He was,” she said, looking down at the
matches, “a man that more than one woman, I
guess, would have liked to kill.”
But, for all his questioning and her appar-
ently patient submission to it, he got no further
facts. At last, seeing that she was nearly over-
come by weakness, he contented himself with her
promise that she would divulge nothing to any-
body. Like Altillero, she recognized the advan-
tage to herself of maintaining absolute silence.
And, again like Altillero, she had, the detective
felt sure, told him only a part of what she knew.


TEIE THOROUGH MR. REVIS 171
“But I'm right!” he exulted inwardly.
“Revis' looking up this woman because he had
heard of her knowing Buckner corroborates my
theory that he tried to make use, or did make use,
of his hold on Mary Haskell. He tried it with
this one. It's typical of the creature, of his de-
graded thoroughness. What was a woman to
him if he couldn't use her?”
He took, as it were, a tighter mental grip on
his conviction that from Mary or Miss Colvin
would come the enlightment he sought. If he
had doubted it, if their stubborn and unchanging
denials had threatened his assurance on the sub-
ject, here was new and encouraging evidence of
the correctness of his theory — so encouraging
that nothing now would induce him to give it up.


XVII
THE PASSING DAYS
AYS went by and the murder of Edward
Revis remained an unexplained affair,
while the newspapers, themselves un-
able to advance a tenable theory as to the mur-
derer's identity, alternately prodded and jeered
the police, demanding decisive action. It was a
story that took the front page of every paper in
the country. Many other cities had local echoes
of it, most of them mere rumours. Here Revis
“had been active some years ago?”; there he “was
known as a shady character.”
Only two of these dispatches, products of the
far-flung search for traces of his past, had the
stamp of truth ! He had lived five years in the
City of Mexico; and he had been connected with
a fake, or unsuccessful, mining venture in the
mountains of western North Carolina “seven or
eight years ago.” But in neither place was any-
body found to acknowledge business association
with him or even personal acquaintance.
This man, so strongly marked by the deformity
of his shoulders that he must have attracted at-
tention wherever he appeared, had gone unre-
172


THE PASSING DAYS 173
garded, had been unable, it seemed, to accomplish
anything, either good or evil, that would leave
a mark on the memories of those who had seen
him.
In addition to the mystery that had surrounded
both his past and his death, gossip and specula-
tion gave to the story another sort of fascination
and interest by pointing out Revis' more or less
spurious connection with “the diplomatic set,”
by hinting that “somebody higher up, a man con-
nected with the government's foreign affairs,”
might be involved in the crime at any time, and
by always returning to the belief that a woman
had committed the murder.
There was as much foundation for one of these
wild guesses as for another. Imaginations,
stirred by constant suspense and filliped by the
growing impression that ultimately the murderer
would go scot free, had next to nothing on which
a probable solution of the problem could be based.
As Darden had predicted, the inquest, without
producing a new fact, was adjourned for a week
from Monday afternoon. The police, speaking
each day through Captain Nash, contented them-
selves with the stereotyped announcement:
“We feel encouraged. We're working on a line
now that makes the arrest of the guilty party
seem assured within the next two or three days.”
The chief of police, only recently appointed


174 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
from civil life to that position, made Nash his
mouthpiece and worked with him night and day.
They interviewed and cross-examined mercilessly
those to whom they naturally looked for evidence.
Lucy Patton, Roger West and Tom Malloy bore
the brunt of this verbal attack, answering will-
ingly for the most part, expressed their hope of
aiding the investigators — and brought out not a
single new important item of information.
There was one exception to this willing volu-
bility — Malloy refused to divulge the name of
the woman about whom, he said, Revis had made
scandalous remarks. He had consulted a law-
yer, and, on his advice, declined to disclose her
identity.
“Don’t you know,” Nash once asked him,
“you're bringing suspicion more and more upon
yourself?”
“No, Captain,” said Malloy, in his drawling
voice; “I don't know that. Do you?”
“Or that you may be charged with the murder
yourself — any minute?”
“No. I don’t believe you think I'm guilty.
I’m sure you don't.”
Darden, coming away from one of those weary-
ing sessions, thought: “The coolest man I ever
encountered, and the bravest! Or is he a plain
fool? Both, perhaps. To be as courageous as
that fellow requires a mixture of folly in his


THE PASSING DAYS 175
make-up. Your thoroughly sane man achieves
prudence. Malloy shows you only a loveable
recklessness.”
At another time he concluded, having caught
the real meaning of one of Malloy's flitting
smiles: “He wouldn’t care if he passed out this
minute. There is in him, deep down in his soul,
a contempt for living, an inexpressible but inef-
faceable weariness — a conviction that the play
isn’t worth the candle.”
It was Darden who prevented the formal
charge of murder being made against him. It
was, in fact, Darden's encouragement and reas-
surance of the police that enabled them to refrain
from any definite action whatever, in spite of the
incessant outside clamour for an arrest — an
arrest of somebody — preferably, Malloy — but
of somebody anyway — in order to bring matters
to a head. Both Nash and his chief were rest-
less and uneasy under the storm of criticism that
broke upon them, the charges of stupidity and
incompetence.
“Pay no attention to it,” Darden advised in
one of their conferences. “When we do act,
they'll be taking off their hats to you, calling you
Solomon and Rhadamanthus.”
“Sounds like the name of a face cream,”
growled Nash.
“If you arrest Malloy,” the detective insisted,


178 THE UNLIGHTED EIOUSE
He studied them from day to day, discovered
new lines in their faces, saw tell-tale lights in
their eyes. In her youth and consequent
strength, Miss Haskell, he saw, had one great ad-
vantage over Miss Colvin in the struggle to stand
unshaken by the ordeal — an ordeal which he
kept always in their consciousness. The older
woman, he felt sure, would be the first to let slip
the ill-advised word or to make the betraying ex-
clamation for which he waited.
He saw them every day, taking care to arrange
his calls so as not to encounter Grimes Buckner
in their apartment. He would question the sen-
ator later. Just now, at his suggestion, the
plain-clothes men were trying to locate any
woman, or women, whom both Revis and the
senator had known. The interview with Lucy
Patton had showed him the advisability of that.
“But,” he reflected, “I haven’t enough to war-
rant my going after him yet. The glove-buttoner
and his old acquaintance with Miss Patton: noth-
ing else. Not enough to make him talk — ample
to freeze him into a sore and up-stage silence.
I’ll Wait.”
Mary and Miss Colvin had decided, at the be-
ginning, not to deny themselves to him. Being
afraid of him, they had adopted the obvious and
transparent subterfuge of proving themselves in-
different to anything he might say, any questions


THE PASSING DAYS 179
he might ask. But for this mistake on their part
— one which in all probability they would not
have made if they had foreseen the frequency and
length of his visits — he would have been hard
put to it to “exhaust their strength.”
Seeing him as often as they did, however, they
could not understand his attitude toward them.
Mary had the impression, although she character-
ized it as ridiculous, that he felt sorry for them.
He gave her the idea that he sincerely regretted
the mistake they had made in not confiding in
him, and wanted to assure them that, when they
did give him the truth, they would find in him a
helpful friend. He even succeeded in adopting
a protective pose.
“But for me,” he told her Tuesday afternoon,
“you'd be receiving newspaper reporters in
bunches now. You took a terrific chance when
you told the telephone girl downstairs yesterday
you'd see ‘nobody but Mr. Darden.” She reads
the papers.”
She saw the truth of that and was alarmed.
“But,” he reassured her, “I’ve fixed that.
She’ll say nothing.”
He had most of his téte-à-têtes with Miss Col-
vin when she left her office in the afternoons,
making it a rule to walk with her to her car, as
he had done on Monday. Sometimes she stood
to one side of the walk with him for a while, look-


180 THE UNLIGHTED BIOUSE
ing up to him out of her restless, gleaming little
eyes, while she answered his rapid questioning.
To her he was always flattering, as if he trusted
to the excellence of her judgment to move the
younger woman to frankness. Such appeals to
her vanity were not always easy. In the biting
winds of those bleak March afternoons, she was
especially unattractive to the eye — her nose red,
her eyes ribbed with pink, handicaps of which, he
knew, she was always conscious. But he stuck
stubbornly to his task, for ever on the watch for
the opening he expected.
Wednesday afternoon, following a long talk
with Lucy Patton, he remarked, without preface,
to Addie:
“That woman whose foolishness was to give
Revis the confidential information — he boasted
Sunday afternoon, I find now, that he had known
her a long time.”
She put up her hand to rearrange an end of her
scarf fluttering in the wind.
“Yes?” she returned indifferently, after that
pause.
“Yes. It occurred to me that you'd like to
know about it. You might see the advisability
of talking it over with Miss Haskell.”
“Why?” she asked, and moved forward, to go
to the car.
“The reason's obvious. Could he have been


XVIII
A NEW ATTACK
RIDAY afternoon he prolonged his talk
with Miss Colvin and, accompanying her
home on the street car, found Miss Has-
kell there when they arrived. The older woman
had not missed a day from her desk. Mary, on
the other hand, had taken a week's leave, devot-
ing all her energy to the two-fold task of uncom-
municativeness to Darden and responsiveness to
Buckner's happiness.
Of the two, she seemed to have suffered most
under the strain. Her pallor persisted, with the
bluish shadows beneath her eyes, and, in the de-
tective's presence, she had a dull, lethargic bear-
ing, as if the uninterrupted watch she had put
upon herself had reduced her to a timidity of
which she was forever conscious. The old dash
and alacrity had gone out of her gesticulation.
She dealt, when she could, in monosyllables only.
Addie's uneasiness showed in a constant fur-
tiveness of eye, although her face was less
changed than Mary's. That might have been,
Darden reflected, because she used the same
amount of rouge and because the years had put
182


A NEW ATTACK 183
on her long, gaunt face with its weatherbeaten
skin a fixed and final appearance that was un-
susceptible of pronounced alteration. She con-
veyed very clearly, too, the idea that she left the
initiative to Mary in everything; that she relied
on the girl as the natural guide and leader in this
difficulty.
They had had five days of suspense, time
enough to reduce them to the constant fear by
day that something might occur to break down
their silence, time enough to put into their minds
by night the half-despairing hope that something,
no matter what, would happen to put an end to
this intolerable waiting, this expectancy of a blow
that might be dealt them unawares and before
they could foresee whence it came — time enough,
he had decided, for him to put additional pressure
upon them in the reasonable hope of getting
results.
He began by referring, for the first time, to the
disappearance of Lizzie Wilson.
“I see,” he remarked, with an air of friendly
interest, “the servant problem's bothered you
this week — hasn’t it?”
Mary, in her accustomed place by the window,
remembered that he had had no opportunity to
see the new maid, who had been employed only
yesterday.
Addie, who without taking off her outdoor


184 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
things had gone to a seat by the table, answered
him with sufficient promptness to escape an awk-
ward pause.
“Oh, yes,” she said, eyes narrowed as she re-
turned his look; “Lizzie's gone.”
“Discharged?” he asked quickly, and, when
he saw Addie's instinctive glance of inquiry to-
ward Mary, explained smoothly: “I’m more or
less interested in her departure myself. Can we
be sure she had nothing to do with the theft of
the confidential information?” At that, Mary
raised her eyes, plainly surprised by his sugges-
tion. He purposely misunderstood her astonish-
ment: “Perhaps, Miss Haskell, she did steal
something—” He paused before concluding:
“— and you fired her? — Did she?”
“Why, yes,” Mary had to answer him; “she
did. She –”
“She did what many of them do,” Addie took
up the explanation, making it a light lamentation
for the unreliability of servants; “she stole some
clothing — a skirt of mine.”
“And you, Miss Haskell — you were going to
say?”
“No,” Mary turned it off with a faint smile;
“I think she concluded my style of dress wasn't
to her liking.”
He let the inquiry drop there, left it as another


A NEW ATTACK 185
of his adroit contributions to their wretchedness
— another reminder that they might not hope to
escape his vigilant and informed survey of their
movements and affairs. They were convinced
that he knew about the stolen revolver.
Addie, obviously disturbed, left the room.
Crossing over to where Mary sat, he took the
chair facing her. Twilight had begun to steal
into the room, but at the window there was a good
light from the glow in the western sky.
She did the unusual and began the conversa-
tion.
“Don’t you think, Mr. Darden,” she asked him,
making no concealment of her resentment,
“you’ve tried our patience sufficiently? Don't
you think we’ve been more than fair in admitting
you to this apartment at all times, whenever
you've come here? And don't you think you've
questioned us enough, persecuted us enough, to
see that there's nothing we have to tell, nothing
We can tell ?”
She put these questions swiftly, her eyes dark
with anger.
He paused, reflective, before he answered her.
“I was just wondering, when I came over
here,” he said, without either indignation or em-
barrassment, “if you’d understand my congratu-
lating you on the way you’ve — well — the way


186 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
you've carried things off with Senator Buckner.”
She was silent, moveless save for her short,
laboured breathing.
“Miss Colvin tells me,” he went on, “that
Mrs. Buckner, his mother, is to meet you, is to
call here tomorrow afternoon.”
Still she made no comment.
“What I mean, Miss Haskell,” he said then,
with an earnestness she had never observed in
him, “is that I admire you, admire your cour-
age.” He leaned nearer, challenging her unbe-
lief. “Can't you see — won't you believe me
when I tell you I sympathize with you, am sorry
for you, in your trouble?”
She laughed shortly.
“You have an unconventional way of showing
your — sympathy, did you say?”
He refused to be discouraged.
“At least, then,” he persisted, “you believe
me when I tell you I understand you, your prob-
lem, even your hopes and aspirations — as con-
nected with that miserable business of Sunday
night. Don't you believe that?”
She had the absurd impression — and gave her.
self mental warning that it was absurd — that he
actually did sympathize with her; rather, that he
clearly understood her as she was now situated.
She saw the light of it in his melancholy and
somehow appealing eyes. There was the ring of


188 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
He held her interest, if nothing more. She
leaned back in her chair, the fading light strong
enough to show him the growing perplexity that
she felt.
“I understand how a girl, a girl child, may be
led into a purple hour, that hour when the stars
come down to earth and — Do you see? And
how, out of that hour, may come nothing but re-
gret. I see, too, how that girl, reaching the
strength and nobility of womanhood, may put all
of that memory behind her, as she would tear a
page from a book, and make desperate resolve to
let it play no part in her life — to accomplish, as
it were, her own resurrection through the fires
of her remorse. I can —”
“But the point of all this, please!” she de-
manded, in a small voice. “Why do —”
He disregarded the interruption, proceeded
with extraordinary fervour:
“A moment more, if you will! I can see, too,
how that woman hopes and longs for love. I
can appreciate the happiness, the ineffable felic-
ity, of that hour when the later and real love
comes into her life. I can hear her saying:
“Here is my reward at last! Here, too, is the
proof that I was right to forget that other and
to long for this.-And– just a moment more!”
he begged, shutting off a second interruption.
“I can see, too, her indignant horror, her burn-


A NEW ATTACK 189
ing and desperate hatred, of the man who, having
given her that bitterness of sorrow when she was
a mere child, reappears when the real love is
hers, when the cup of her happiness is held to
her lips by the hand of the truly beloved. She
would be justified — that woman, I think, Miss
Haskell, would be justified in doing many things,
most things, to make her happiness sure, to
escape the sliming touch of that other's hand.”
She looked at him in awful fascination, trust
and distrust alternately swaying her. He was
gazing out of the window, but his face, his whole
pose, threw toward her a gentle interrogatory, a
lingering plea for response from her. He waited
a long time, pensive, melancholy.
“So you've loved — you have!” she breathed,
finally.
“Yes,” he said gently.
It was so dark now that the features of one
were not to be clearly seen by the other. That
fact caused her a vague alarm. His hands were
extended toward her, just visible in the gloom,
as if he asked her for some favour, her belief in
him. What was he thinking? Was this another
of his tricks to put her off her guard? Besides,
how could he help her? He was a detective,
sworn to bring to justice anybody and everybody
connected with the Revis murder. His insight,
amazing as it seemed, was after all the craft and


190 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
subtlety of an enemy! If she told him what
she —
He heard the gasp with which she slid forward
to the edge of her seat, springing to her feet as
if to throw off the influence of what he had said.
He also rose, waiting until she had crossed the
room and snapped on the lights, before he fol-
lowed her.
Facing her across the table, he saw the hunted
look on her face, a fair representation of the men-
tal confusion that still engulfed her, a reflection
of how hardly her prudence checked her desire to
ask for his help, to throw herself upon his sym-
pathy. Her features looked pinched, haggard.
He felt a grateful surprise that his words had
affected her so tremendously. He made another
appeal:
“I can understand, too, her disappointment,
her heartbreak, if, at the last, the man she loved
failed to understand the motives that had led her
to put out of sight the old, old mistake. What a
tragedy if he did not appreciate her desire to save
him from the unhappiness of knowing about her
old unhappiness! There are so many of us,” he
said, his tone making his lot one with hers, “who
know what it is to be crushed under the weight
of our own illusions. We make these sacrifices,
run these risks — are, perhaps, a little selfish be-
cause of love, for the sake of keeping love invio-


A NEW ATTACK 191
late, unharmed — only to find that the other
doesn’t understand, doesn’t appreciate what
We —”
“Don’t ' " she cried out. “Don’t l”
For a moment she stood, wavering on her feet,
staring at him in pitiful appeal.
“Why won't you let me help you?” he urged
gently. “Why do you fight against me?”
She started violently; the tears came into her
eyes. Before he could speak again, she turned
suddenly away from him and, hands covering her
face, left the room, lurching blindly against the
wall as she went out.
“If I had been anybody else,” he thought,
“anybody else at all, she would have asked me
to help her.”
Assured at last that she would not come back,
he left the apartment.
He had crossed the main corridor and had
started to go down the stairs on the far side of
the elevator when he heard his name called softly.
Miss Colvin had followed him and closed the
apartment door behind her.


CONTRIBUTED BY MISS CALVIN 193
w
she held her head thrust forward, was grotesquely
thin. The tremors that shook her from head to
foot revealed pitilessly all her awkwardness.
There was no doubt of what that tremendous
agitation meant. He knew, after one look at her,
that she had taken a desperate resolve; that, as
he had planned and expected, she was about to
capitulate, about to yield to the persuasion of all
the suspense to which he had subjected her.
For a moment he was conscious of a feeling of
repugnance. The ugliness of the woman jarred
him. Besides, he did not like her, never had
liked her — and he resented her hypocrisy, the
treachery she was about to commit in breaking
the silence which she had promised the other
woman to maintain.
That, however, was for a brief moment only.
He put it aside, feeling the thrill of accomplish-
ing the thing he had set out to do. He had no
doubt that he was about to be put in possession
of facts which would make good his solution of
all that mystery. After a hesitation too brief
to have caught her notice, he drew forward a
chair, careful to display no more than a polite
attentiveness.
Keeping her eyes on him, she reached out a
trembling hand and, groping for the back of the
chair, pushed it to the farthest wall. She fol-
lowed it with a long, sidling step and sat down,
-


194 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
looking up to him, her fast winking eyes showing
him a cowering terror.
“Why don’t you — why don't you do some-
thing, take action to — to bring all this to an
end?”
She spoke a little above a whisper, her manner
a mixture of eagerness to talk to him and caution
against being overheard. He drew over another
chair and sat opposite her, his brows lifted, indi-
cating a well-controlled surprise.
“What can I do, Miss Colvin?” he asked,
lowering his voice in response to her guarded
whispering.
He was casting about in his mind for the cause
of her sudden decision to confide in him. Some-
thing in her bearing convinced him that, al-
though she had considered for some time what
she was about to do, she had been rushed into it
now from a motive so compelling, so irresistible,
that she had not given herself time to collect her
faculties. By a combination of motives, he sus-
pected.
He realized that his revelation of knowledge of
the stolen revolver had affected her deeply. He
was certain also that she had heard his highly
emotional request of Miss Haskell that she treat
him as ally rather than as enemy. Such a two-
fold assault upon her self-control might have
moved her to a step which, although she had long


CONTRIBUTED BY MISS CALVIN 195
wanted to take it, still terrorized her when she
considered its possible effects.
“Do? What can you do!” she echoed. “You
can arrest somebody, make an arrest, act!”
The muscles of her lips played her queer tricks,
made her lips tremble or move aimlessly when she
tried to close them firmly.
“But why just now — tonight?” he insisted,
his voice kindly.
“Why, Mr. Darden? You ask me why?"
She put up a hand as if to take hold of his arm,
but withdrew it, the infirm gesture uncompleted.
“Why, to save Mary, to save her reason . She's
on the verge of insanity. Her sufferings are
something awful — awful, I tell you. This sus-
pense is killing her. She can’t endure it much
longer and live — much longer and be sane. I
don’t know how much she knows, but, whatever
it is, it would be better for her to be forced to
tell it all than to go on this way. Don't you see
that? You must 1 *
He looked his sympathy. “But what can I
do?”
“Arrest the guilty man' "
“The man guilty of what?”
“Of both — the theft and that murder!”
He bent closer. “Who? Who is it that's
guilty?”
“You know as well as I do !” She drew in her


196 TEIE UNLIGHTED EIOUSE
breath with a sound that was between a whisper
and a hiss. “You know it's Tom Malloy . "
He reflected, a calculated delay to add to the
agony of her suspense. He was sure that, in
making this acusation, her prime incentive was
hatred of Malloy, not concern for Miss Haskell's
welfare. “The murder, probably — but the
theft. You think he stole that information?”
“Do I think sol” She indulged in a furious
sarcasm, and with a clenched hand struck her
restless, bony knee. “So do you! Let me tell
you. He —”
She paused, listening, in a curious attitude
that kept her glance meeting his but flung all her
attentive interest in the direction of the hangings.
After a moment of that, she sprang up and ran
to the curtains, drew one a little aside and peered
out. Reassured, she went back to him.
“Listen! He's known for a long time how to
get in here without being seen. He told Mary
about it last Monday, the time he came in to see
her. He can stand outside the building and, by
looking at the revolving door from a certain
angle, he can watch the elevator shaft, see when
the elevator boy is up on some of these floors.
Then, by avoiding the girl in the telephone alcove,
he can get to the staircase and run up without
being seen.”
“You mean he did that —”


CONTRIBUTED BY MISS CALVIN 197
w
“I mean,” she took him up, some of her words
framed so swiftly that they ended on a squeaking
wheeze, “our apartment wasn’t usually locked
when one of us was at home. I mean Malloy had
the entree, was in the habit of strolling in unan-
nounced, without ringing the bell even.” She
did catch hold of his sleeve now, clinging to him,
her pose like a prayerful appeal for his atten-
tion and credulity. “I mean he could have done
all that the night the senator was in there, when
that draft was in his overcoat pocket in the hall.
You see? Don't you see?”
He assumed disappointment, smiling his regret
that her news was not more sensational. “You
mean he did that — that night?”
“I mean that's my idea — more than an idea.”
She stopped, listened toward the curtains and
turned to him again. The sound of her breath-
ing was audible, unpleasant to hear. She eyed
him uncertainly, like a person who, already de-
cided on a vital act, nevertheless craves encour-
agement in the doing of it.
“Something else?” he queried. “What is
it?”
She still hesitated, brushing her thin lips with
the ends of her fingers.
“If I give you some information, will you use
it for that child's good and — and not involve me
in it, not let it be known that I gave it to you?”


198 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
“Is it safe, Miss Colvin, for me to make that
promise?”
She was contemptuous of his doubts: “Cer-
tainly Would I offer it if it wasn’t?”
“What is it, then?”
“Malloy knew Revis a long time ago — knew
him well — seven years ago — in North Caro-
lina.” -
“Malloy knew Revis!” he exclaimed. “I
thought you were going to say Miss Haskell had
known him then.”
“Isn't Malloy enough?”
“A great deal, certainly,” he assented, and
looked his expectancy of more, goading her with
his evident belief that she could, and would, tell
him all she knew. He put that into words:
“There's something else yet, Miss Colvin — isn’t
there?” - -
She went toward the hangings, beginning her
departure.
“You might examine him again, and more
closely, as to his whereabouts that Sunday night
when the facts were stolen — the night the sen-
ator had them here, in his overcoat pocket. Peo-
ple coming home that night a little early from the
theatre might have seen — well, might have seen
anybody coming out of the Arlewood — in a
hurry. Ask him about that.” She put aside the
hangings. “I must hurry back. Mary mustn't


200 THE UNLIGHTED EIOUSE
f
that was surprising. She had the appearance of
a person closely pursued, darting with a gasp of
relief into a longed for retreat.
His efficient mind had begun already to ap-
praise this new material.
“If Malloy knew Revis seven years ago,” he
analyzed, “the chances increase that Mary Has-
kell knew Revis seven years ago — as I’ve sus-
pected from the first. But, even if Malloy did
know him, he'll deny it now. And Mary Haskell
will continue to deny it. How, then, to get action
On it?
“Buckner? No; Miss Haskell wouldn't tell
Buckner; could deceive him, in fact. And Mal-
loy wouldn't tell Buckner any more than he'd tell
me.— But Buckner's mother — she'd get some-
thing out of the girl her son's going to marry.
She would, or die trying ! — I — yes; Mrs. Buck-
ner is about to have a caller, an unexpected
visitor — in short, Mr. George Darden, of the De-
partment of Justice.”


XX
º SENATORIAL SECRETS
R. DARDEN was in conference with
Mr. Fleming, shrewdest of all the oper-
atives of the Department of State, a
lank and cadaverous man who wore rimless spec-
tacles and continuously smoked long thin cigars
that harmonized with his keen, knife-like cast of
countenance. Fleming realized, but did not re-
sent, the fact that up to this point Darden had
ignored him entirely as a possible factor in the
attempt to uncover the identity of Revis' mur-
derer. He had the good nature of the lazy man,
and twenty years of government service had
sucked him dry of professional jealousy. Satis-
fied to finish each day's work, he left to others the
pseudo-thrills of imagined fame. Sprawled far
down in his chair, so that he seemed to sit on his
shoulder blades, he rested his feet on a leaf of his
desk and smilingly submitted to Darden's queries
— an examination which asked for much without
giving even a little in return.
Darden had reached the conclusion that he
needed all the help he could get. From all quar.
201


202 THE UNLIGHTED BIOUSE
ters the pressure for an arrest in the Revis case
had become tremendous; and Nash and the chief
of police, pointing out his failure to produce the
conclusive evidence he had promised, had an-
nounced their intention of formally charging
Malloy with the crime.
“Give me until tomorrow morning,” he had re-
quested, and to that they had reluctantly agreed.
That was at noon, on Saturday. Two hours
later he was in Fleming's office, checking off with
impressive solemnity the series of facts with
which both of them were familiar.
“It’s a tough case,” he concluded.
“An unusually tough case,” assented Fleming.
“You fellows have worked all the time on the
theory that Buckner might have let that informa-
tion out himself — haven’t you?”
“We thought it possible, worth looking into.”
“Why?” *
Fleming grinned. “Are you coming around
to that view, too?”
Darden made qualified agreement: “That it's
possible—yes.”
Fleming waited, the cigar tilted at such an
angle that it touched the end of his nose.
“That is,” Darden elaborated, “he’s at least so
mixed up in the thing that it's necessary to know
exactly how far he went before we can be sure of
— well, what other people did — or didn’t do.”


SENATORIAL SECRETS 203
“And you want to know from me — just
What?”
“Just what you know,” smiled Darden. “I’ll
tell you, Fleming, I made a mistake in opening
up the case. I went on the assumption that
Buckner was a man who didn’t like women.”
Fleming could not forego that opening.
“Have you ever seen one of those thick-lipped,
heavy-featured, “dominant’ guys who didn’t?”
“But, as you know, he was heels-over-head in
love with Miss Haskell — I thought. You got
that, too, I suppose?” The other nodded.
“And I couldn't figure him in on any woman
that Revis knew — that is, seriously.”
“And you want to ask me?”
“About Miss Conner — Martha Conner.” -
Fleming's cigar moved violently up and down,
as if wigwagging its owner's sudden interest.
“Ah! So you’ve heard of Miss Conner.”
“Yes. Like you fellows over here, I finally
saw the advisability of looking up all the women
who might have enjoyed the friendship of both
Buckner and Revis. And, again like you, I got
the telephone records bearing on the Revis house
the murder night. Calls went from the house to
Miss Martha Conner and Miss Lucy Patton.”
“And,” supplemented Fleming, deflecting the
cigar from interference with the line of his vision,
“to Senator Buckner.”


204 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
“Yes,” smiled Darden; “to him, too, I find.”
“All we know about Miss Conner,” Fleming
gave him the information, “is that she's a nifty
looking little brunette, thirty or thereabouts; has
a job in the Interior Department; generally has
some man devoted to her; and lives quietly.”
“And last Sunday night she went to the Revis
house — didn't she?”
That was his big question. It was what he had
come to Fleming to find out. Nash's men had
been unable to throw any light on it, except to
repeat the lady's denial that she had been out of
her apartment at all that evening. She admitted
having received the telephone message, even re-
peated its substance, which was at first an invi-
tation from Revis, and later an urgent demand,
that she go to his house, arriving there at ten
o'clock. But that she had gone, she said, was a
preposterous idea. She had had no callers that
night, had communicated with nobody during
the evening. In fact, her story, so far as the
attempted alibi was concerned, duplicated Miss
Patton's.
“I believe she did,” Fleming answered lan-
guidly. “I believe she did— but I don't know.
There's no evidence that she did. Andrews, our
man, you know, who put her over the hurdles in
regard to it, says he'd swear she went. But it
rests there: we can't prove it.”


208 TEIE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
“she's had me on the wrong end of this thread
ever since the start, merely because of her fear
of Buckner's finding out something about her
past! Suppose she doesn’t know a thing about
the murder! Suppose I’ve merely imagined and
read into all her terror and suffering the signi-
cance I’ve attached to it! What an amazing and
ludicrous “sell’ that would be!”
However, his business now was with Buckner.
The time had come to ask that gentleman for an
explanation of the discovery of the glove-buttoner
in Revis’ bedroom, for an explanation of the theft
of the information — in fact, for a great many
explanations. º
“There is,” he decided, “a lot of littleness
back of his so-called greatness.” His eyes, un-
aware of what they looked at, were more melan-
choly than usual. “She may find some day that
he wasn't worth the fight she's made to save him
the pain of — let's say, a revelation.”
He analysed Fleming's belief that Miss Conner
had been in Revis’ house the night of the murder.
Fleming might also have believed — and con-
cealed it from him — that Buckner, too, had been
there. And a man with those convictions would
argue, if given facts in Darden's possession, that
Miss Haskell was shielding Buckner and not
Malloy.
Darden quickened his pace, dismissed that as-


- SENATORIAL SECRETS 209
pect of the mystery: “What difference does it
make? After all, my theory stands. Mary Has-
kell, if she wants to, can give me a clue that will
clear it all up.”


XXI
MRS. BUCKNER CALLS
RIMES BUCKNER, leaving the Senate
restaurant where he had lunched, looked
at his watch. It was half-past two —
and at half-past three his mother was to call on
her future daughter-in-law.
“I’ve told her I’d take you over to see her Sat-
urday,” he had informed Mrs. Buckner Thursday
morning, to put an end to the scene provoked by
his statement that nothing could prevent his
marriage.
“I’ll go alone!” the old lady, jealous and en-
raged, had replied. “I prefer to go alone.”
It had been a stormy conference, a volcanic
discussion, his mother's sarcasm merciless but
unavailing against his stubborn and at times
sullen determination. She referred with savage
ridicule to “this Cinderella adventure,” to his
absurd “antics in the rôle of a young Lochinvar,”
to “the dramatic but sometimes distressing
things a man learns later — or too late — about
the woman he's victoriously plucked forth from
the obscurity she adorns.”
210


212 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
to the apartment by Lizzie's successor. He had
come, he thought, much too early. Following
his habit, he gave his coat and hat to the maid
and went down the hall to the open door of the
living room.
He stopped on the threshold, transfixed by the
scene before him. It was a study in still life,
although he felt immediately the electric tension
of the atmosphere into which he had come. His
mother stood beside the centre table, stiffly erect,
her bearing indicating a stern and arrogant en-
joyment of victory. Mary was at the window,
also standing, her hands behind her, fingers en-
twined in the lace curtains at her back and caus-
ing little ripples to stir them to the top. She had
the look of being at bay. Her eyes were dark,
and wide with terror.
“What's this?” he demanded angrily, ad-
dressing Mrs. Buckner from the doorway.
“Don’t be ridiculous, Grimes!” she admon-
ished him, over her shoulder, not taking her eyes
off the girl at the window.
Mary made no move.
He went farther into the room and faced his
mother:
“What have you done to her?”
Mrs. Buckner's mouth was set to a hard line.
Her white hair, piled high from her forehead,
gave her a look of command. All her clear-cut,


MRS. BUCKNER CALLS 213
-*
high-standing features were moulded to an ex-
pression of cruelty, which did not soften before
her son's anger.
“Done to her! Nothing! I merely asked her
a question which, much to my surprise, lifted her
out of that chair there and sent her reeling
against the window.”
“What question?”
“I asked her,” his mother replied, with open
enjoyment, “about her experience some years ago
— seven years ago — in a place called Bolewood,
in North Carolina — her experience with Mr. Ed-
ward Revis.”
“With Revis!” The two words were a roar,
directed to the girl. “Your experience!”
Mrs. Buckner took a seat, leaning an elbow on
the table, and smiled, looking at her son.
Mary slipped slowly into her chair, a huddled
figure, her eyes on the older woman. *
“When you came in,” Mrs. Buckner told him
in a stage aside, “she was about to explain to me.
Doubtless, she will — to you now.”
Mary caught at that eagerly. “I will explain
to you, alone, Grimes, at any time,” she said in a
whisper, “to you, by yourself!”
Before he could answer, a voice from the door-
way replied to Mrs. Buckner's taunt. Tom Mal-
loy had come in unheard.
“If she doesn't, I’ll be glad to ' " he an-


218 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
had separate rooms, on different floors. There
was nothing else to do. But later, in the mid-
dle of the night — I didn’t know about hotels; I
was only a child — I hadn't locked my door —
and he came in, came into my room.”
She had a moment of self-communion, in which
the most terrible thing in all her life came back
to her, as fresh in its hideousness as it had been
seven years ago — her terror in the darkness, the
man's impassioned and fiery talk about his awful
design, his breath on her cheek, his hold upon
her arm, her flight winged by panic, her haunt-
ing sense of degradation. To the paralysing ef-
fect of that recollection was added the destroying
realization' that here, in these circumstances,
there was no shadow of hope that she would be
believed — the realization, indeed, that her inno-
cence would not have been believed at any
time, anywhere — by Grimes Buckner.
“Really, Grimes' ' Mrs. Buckner rose.
“Somehow, in some way,” Mary forced herself
to conclude the agonizing confession, “I got out
of that room, got away, into the streets, and
started to walk back to Bolewood. It was the
middle of the next night before I did get back.”
She rose also, unconsciously influenced by the
other woman's standing posture, and presented
to Buckner's scrutiny a pallid and hopeless face.
She continued, not so much to convince him as


MRS. BUCKNER CALLS 219
to reiterate her innocence with all the courage
left in her. - -
“You believe me, Grimes? You believe I’m
speaking the truth — the whole truth — you see
that, don't you?”
He hesitated.
“For a pause like that, in reply to that ques-
tion,” Malloy warned him, “the men in that
camp would have struck you in the face. They .
loved her so — knew so well she was above even
the thought of evil.”
Mrs. Buckner laughed, on an insulting note.
Buckner, ignoring Malloy, answered Mary.
He spoke in a shaking voice, in a low tone, as
if he thought the other two did not hear him.
“Then, you killed him That's what you did
— you and Malloy' You killed him, to hush
that scandal up. Believe you?” He taunted
her with fearful scorn. “Believe you?”
He turned to his mother. “Hadn't we better
go? xx
“I thought that some time ago!” she re-
torted.
Mary sank slowly, like a victim of complete
collapse, to the chair behind her. -
“Wait!”
The command was from Malloy. Buckner, en-
raged anew by the frank threat it conveyed,
wheeled toward him, only to find himself looking


220 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
into laughing eyes. He was at a loss, bewil-
dered by the contrast between the cold rage that
had sounded in the one word and the undecipher-
able banter he saw in the man's eyes.
“You!” Malloy, hands thrust into his pockets,
lifting and lowering himself on the balls of his
feet, taunted him with menacing levity. “Am I
to take you seriously — particularly, your as-
tounding accusation against Miss Haskell and
myself?”
“Take it or leave it!” Buckner snapped.
“It's my opinion, and I expect to see it proved.”
A shuddering moan, the very essence of an-
guish, escaped Miss Haskell's lips. Malloy, ex-
tending his arm, held a steady, threatening hand
within a few inches of Buckner's contorted face.
“How?” he demanded, the thrumming note
in his voice. “By what you saw yourself?”
“How's that?” The uncertain question came
haltingly past Buckner's dropped jaw.
“You were there that night yourself! Now, I
ask you again: do you propose to prove my guilt
and — hers?”
Buckner's pallor was suddenly as pronounced
as Mary's. He made shift to laugh, a harsh
sound from lips whose corners did not go up.
He waved his arm, with no forcefulness in the
gesture.
“You’re talking nonsense — dribbling non-


MRS. BUCKNER CALLS 221
sense,” he said, in pretended contempt. “Some
other time, if you've anything serious to say to
me —” He turned to his mother, presenting his
arin.
Malloy pressed him closer. “Get this, Buck-
ner,” he said, cool and deliberate: “if you give
so much as a hint — if so much as a hint that
you may be held responsible for — if anything
at all is communicated from you or those near
you to anybody about Miss Haskell's presence
in that house, or about what she's told you here
this afternoon — if anything of all this becomes
known, I'll bring a murder charge against you
the moment I know it. What's more, I’ll tes-
tify that you were in Revis' house the night
Revis was murdered, late that night you were
there, and that you quarrelled with him. I'll
testify to that, and more, because I know it, of
my own personal knowledge!” He repeated,
with precise clarity: “Of my own personal
knowledge.”
“Really, Grimes!” Mrs. Buckner, contemptu-
ous, incredulous, pressed his arm, a signal for
departure.
“A lie!” he growled, with difficulty. “Black-
mail pure and simple!”
“Take care! Take care!” Malloy jeered him,
with a return of his cool levity. “I don’t like
to be called a liar. And, perhaps, it's only a


“ UNANSWERABLE EVIDENCE * 225
money or from fear of exposing of something in
your life; third, that there's a woman scandal
you're afraid of.”
Buckner, his face a little flushed, the thatch
of his heavy brows far down over his eyes, be-
trayed no special agitation at that.
“And the facts you refer to,” he rasped out.
“What are they — to back up any such stuff as
that?”
The grey globe of cigarette smoke had closed
around Darden's head. His words came through
the thick haze of it with a sort of gentleness, in
a series of exquisitely modulated cadences, en-
tirely free of vindictiveness or even dislike.
“So far as I know them, they are these:
Revis telephoned you, at your house, sometime
before ten o'clock the night of the murder.
After that call, you went down to the back of
your house, where your small car was parked,
and drove yourself to Revis’ house. You found
there Revis and a friend of yours, a Miss Conner,
Miss Martha Conner. There was a row, an al-
tercation — what you please to call it — a re-
volver shot, a flight, a woman making her escape
— perhaps, through the front basement window.
You followed, I take it. Dr. Felton, unfortu-
nately, didn’t wait to discover whether a second
person followed the fleeing woman he saw.
“Later I found Miss Haskell's gold glove-but-


226 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
toner near Revis’ bed. That buttoner was last
in your possession. Which brings Miss Haskell
into the events of that night. My supposition is
that she's kept quiet all this time, refused to di-
vulge what she saw in the house, simply to pro-
tect you — the man she's engaged to — from ar-
rest. It may be, too, that Malloy's silence can
be explained in the same way. He's a quixotic
sort of a character, and, loving Miss Haskell, he
was willing to undergo the disgrace of suspicion
if, in that way, he could help her to save you
and make her happiness secure. Understand
me: I don't say that either of them saw you do
the murder. Their very evident suspicions are
merely additional links in the – well, what I
consider the unanswerable evidence against you,
circumstantial evidence.”
Buckner had slid forward, elbows on the pol-
ished surface of the desk, chin in his hands, eyes
shining back of the overshadowing thickness of
his brows.
“And the altercation which, you so succinctly
state, ended in the shooting?” he asked, with a
simulation of irony. “What was that about?”
“Revis’ desire to get possession of the treaty
facts, the draft in your possession, which he
wanted to sell to Altillero. He already had a
part of that information. If you refused to give
the remainder, Miss Conner was to precipitate a


228 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
*
the strength of his powerful jaws, throwing his
weight first to one arm and then to the other,
and all the time glaring through the smoke in
front of Darden, trying to see the meaning of
his half-obscured speculative eyes.
“You’ve said,” the detective reminded him,
“the only time that draft was out of your office
safe here was last Sunday a week ago, after the
Secretary of State had given it to you. Your
pocket wasn't picked in the hotel dining-room
where you had dinner, was it? Nobody at the
Arlewood had an opportunity to see the draft,
except Miss Haskell, and surely you consider her
above suspicion, don't you? Lizzie, the maid,
didn’t see it — we've shadowed her and seen that
she's had no chance to dispose of it — besides,
she's out of range of possibilities anyway, isn’t
she?
“Miss Colvin came home from Keith's as you
were leaving, and she wasn't in the apartment
when you got there that night, was she? So, if
you didn't stop elsewhere that afternoon and
evening, where else could the facts have got out
except that next Sunday night, the murder night,
in Rewis' house? Where else? Miss Conner's
flat, perhaps?” -
“You’re right, Darden' " The senator's voice
was suddenly shaky and sharp, comparable to
that of a woman’s when nearing hysterics. “It


“ UNANSWERABLE EVIDENCE * 229
looks as if I’m about to be sacrificed by accident.
But you're a fair man. You wouldn't counten-
ance a thing like that — would you?”
“By accident?” Darden inquired softly, and
busied himself with the lighting of another ciga-
rette.
Buckner threw down his cigar and, maintain-
ing his groping, baffled stare into the detective's
eyes, fumbled in the open drawer for another.
“I’m going to tell you something,” he began,
with a peculiar eagerness. His whole manner
was tinged with eagerness, a feverish clumsiness,
like that of a man trying to grasp more objects
than he has hands. He leaned far forward
again, hands spread flat, palms down, leaving
streaks of moisture on the top of the desk as
they slipped toward Darden. “I was in that
house — that night! I —”
The confession was cut off by the opening of
the door to the outer office. Before turning to
the intruder, he lingered long enough for a final
attempt to interpret the other's eyes. So far as
he could see, they expressed nothing — neither
sympathy nor surprise, neither hostility nor ela-
tion.
“I’m sorry, sir,” his secretary apologized,
handing him a card; “but this man simply
couldn't be put off; he said you'd see him; threat-
ened to force his way in.”


“UNANswerABLE EVIDENCE" 231
a look of franker hatred or deadlier menace than
the smiling, cool glance with which he swept the
senator's burly figure.
“What monkey-tricks are these?” he asked
blandly. “Barring me out — barring out me,
with my store of interesting facts! Why, Sen-
ator, it's an outrage — an outrage to which, I
assure you, I couldn’t think of submitting.”
He laughed, from the top of his throat, and
came to a halt, leaning his left hip against the
desk edge so that he confronted Buckner and
could see Darden with a look over his shoulder.
“I said I’d see you in a minute!” Buckner
growled. “I know we had things to talk over.”
“In a minute, my dear Senator?” Malloy
quizzed with raised eyebrows. “Hoity-toity!
What strange airs are these? In a minute!
Why, man, you're trifling with doom — and you
impudently talk of ‘in a minute’ſ ” -
Buckner's shoulders sank, as if under the
weight of an invisible and intolerable burden.
“If you'll sit down while I finish an explana-
stion I’ve just begun to Mr. —”
Malloy, throwing off his air of levity, straight-
ened suddenly and shot out his arm, cutting off
the flow of Buckner's words.
“Explanation' " he said scornfully, and
wheeled toward the detective: “I’ll do the ex-
plaining right now, Mr. Darden' I came here


232 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
to give him the benefit of my knowledge before
taking it to you — a private treat, as it were,
something for him to gloat over in secret before
it became public property. But I'm in luck to
find you here. I've an idea I’ll be the better hand
at explaining!” º
Darden was still handicapped by his ignorance
of the encounter at the Arlewood. According
to Mrs. Buckner's plan as he knew it, she must be
at this moment calling on Miss Haskell. With-
out the enlightenment of actual facts, however,
he saw how possessed Malloy was by rage. It
was an extremity of wrath, delighting to prolong
the suffering of its victim and displaying an in-
spired aptness for refined cruelty.
As a matter of fact, Malloy had lost sight of
everything but his fierce determination to make
Buckner pay for Mary's suffering. The real
vision before his eyes was her drawn and stricken
face. There was yet in his ears the sound of her
shuddering moan. Of himself he did not think
at all save as the instrument of her revenge. So
far as his own interests were concerned, his own
identification with the events of the murder
night, his mind was an absolute blank.
Buckner kept his posture, elbows on the desk,
but his face had changed; it no longer mirrored
a swift procession of thoughts; it was a mask of
dullness.


“ UNANSWERABLE EVIDENCE * 233
“This man,” Malloy continued, “was in Revis’
house at ten o'clock last Sunday night. He —”
“I’ve already told him that,” Buckner rum-
bled.
“No doubt! No doubt!” Malloy flicked him
with contemptuous assent. “But have you told
him about the rest of the party? About Martha
Conner? About Revis? Revis’ demand? The
bargain they put up to you? And what you said
in response? There's something that will take
a tidy little bit of explaining! You doubtless
won’t —”
“Some of it I don't deny —”
“Wait until I'm through 1” Malloy stopped
him with a gesture. “You’ll deny nothing I say.
You're talking now to a man who knows! If
you say this, or deny that, or claim the opposite,
remember that I know ! I know because I —”
“Because you were there?” Buckner in his
turn interrupted. “If that's so, you put his
murder up to one of us two, it seems to me. If
there's evidence to show that you were in that
room, actually across the threshold of it —”
Darden spoke at last, quickly, to Malloy:
“How about the shoe-string, on that
point?”
Before Malloy could reply, the detective sprang
up and put a hand on the young man's shoulder,
drawing him to one side. Buckner, silent and


234 TEIE UNLIGHTED EIOUSE
immovable, watched them while Darden, with a
few whispered words, won the reluctant Malloy
to a plan of his own. The senator could see,
from the detective's play of feature, how highly
he valued the tactics to which he urged the
younger man. And, suspicious as he was, he
could find in Darden's face no friendliness for
Malloy, could see nothing there but a cold neu-
trality, a hard and watchful alertness.
He did observe, however, the cautiousness, the
light of wary calculation, that had come into
Malloy's face — an expression that did away with
the blind rage of a moment before.
He protested:
“What's this? A scheme to blacken me? To
save that young fool from the consequences of
his own wild tongue?”
“No,” Darden replied to that, coming back to
the desk. “I made the same request of you, Sen.
ator. You'll agree that, to avoid the arrest of
both of you, a show-down's necessary. There's a
chance that I can get one more piece of evidence
— something, perhaps, too slight and tenuous
to be called proof — but enough to go a long way
toward satisfying me. Mr. Malloy's agreed to
go through with it — to hear that evidence.
Will you?”
It was a request impossible to refuse.
“Anything!” Buckner said, his own rage re-


236 TEIE UNLIGHTED ELOUSE
the document — through the paper on which the
copying was done, you understand — if any of
the writing was done while the copyist's paper
lay on top of any part of the document. You"
know how hard the pressure is on paper with a
pencil.”
“Bosh!” Buckner belittled the suggestion,
chewing his cigar. “Impossible!”
Darden was insistent.
At last, the senator rose and went toward the
safe. Before he knelt down to manipulate the
knob, he mopped both his hands with his handker-
chief. His breathing was stertorous.
“I remember,” he said, striving for the note in
which one discusses the unimportant, “I made
some notes that night after I got home — for the
soldier-bonus speech I delivered in the Senate
the following afternoon. I used some loose
paper, backs of envelopes, stuff like that, and
rested them on this document, for support, firm-
ness, you know. You may find traces of that.”
“Very possibly,” Darden agreed, fingering a
magnifying glass he had taken from his pocket.
“Anyway, I’d like to see.”
“But that —” Buckner began, thought better
of it, and bent down to open the safe. He moved
so wearily, so reluctantly, that he had the air
of being pushed down by some outside force,
rather than of stooping of his own free will.


XXIII
“NOW YOU KNOW! ”
44 OMEHOW you wouldn't believe in my
sympathy,” Darden complained. “You
don’t believe in it now !”
“I don't know,” Miss Haskell admitted dully.
“I don’t know whether I do or not.” -
“Perhaps,” he suggested, with a gentleness she
could not altogether ignore, “just now you're a
little bewildered, past caring about anything.
You've had to endure so much — today.”
“Perhaps.”
It was seven o'clock in the evening. They
were alone in the living room, seated in the
shadowy space just beyond the circular splash of
light outlined on the rugs from the heavily
shaded reading lamp. Nothing he had said had
disturbed her trance-like calm or surprised her
into quick and interested speech.
“And yet,” he reminded her, “nothing but
sympathy could have brought me here now —
when time is so precious — to try to persuade
you into saving yourself from — let's say, un-
pleasantness.”
2. “The desire to find out something?” she coun-
237


“NOW YOU KNOW '' 239
warning you not to let outsiders know of my
keeping your presence there a secret. You see,
I had to know — about that revolver.”
“Still, I — I —” Her voice fell away to
silence.
“You were going to say you didn't use it?”
he urged.
Weariness overwhelmed her again.
“You make all these statements, hoping to
trap me into saying what you want me to say —
Whatever that is.”
“No; I assure you! I merely want you to tell
me — what you can.”
She lifted her hands a little above her lap and
let them fall to each side of her, where they
rested, limp and inert, on the seat of the chair.
Her shoulders dropped forward, her back shaped
like a bow, her head bent down. Every line of
her figure, like every intonation of her voice, was
a definition of complete indifference.
“But,” she said, “there's nothing I can tell.”
“Or nothing you will tell?”
“Have it your own way,” she sighed, in dreary
acquiescence. “Still, there's nothing.”
He fought his own discouragement, began all
over again, talking to her as he had done the
night before, trying to persuade her of his sym-
pathy and understanding. Buckner and Malloy
were waiting in the reception room below, but,


“NOW YOU KNOW '' 241
crushed under the weight of your own illusions.”
That stirred her to a dim remembrance: a
fragment of gossip Addie had brought her one
day — that George Darden had taken up this
work as the result of a tragedy in his own life —
that he was known not entirely because of his
brilliancy in detecting guilt, but also because
of his care in saving the innocent from false ac-
cusation.— Perhaps, then, he might understand
why she —
She shrugged, ashamed of this faint interest in
him. But, as he talked, she shaped in her mind,
mistily, a new identity of him. The music of his
voice, the things of which he spoke, the dull tor-
ture of her own anguish — all this for a moment
drew her into a communion of spirit with him,
made him far more dangerous to her than he had
ever been.
If she were not quite so tired, she thought, she
might argue with him, discuss these facts and
suppositions which fell from his lips with such
rapidity that she could neither understand nor
value them. Would he never stop? Was there
no way to be rid of him? It seemed to her that
all her life he, or some one like him, had perse-
cuted her!
She put up one hand convulsively and caught
the arm of her chair, and immediately withdrew
it, feeling ashamed of the sensation that had com-



244 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
She tried to shudder and could not move, tried
to cry out and felt merely a twitching of the mus-
cles of her throat. It was like being horribly
intruded upon, cruelly violated in spirit.
All thought of resistance left her. What was
the use? What did he want to know? — who had
killed that creature? Very well!— He could
know! —
She heard herself sigh, a sigh of immeasurable
relief, and for a moment felt rested, as if she had
let slip from her a great weight which she had
carried a long way for a long time without en-
thusiasm and under compulsion. She moved
uneasily. Why did he continue to look at her
so? Why did his features change to a pleasant
smile? Surely, surely, there was nothing pleas-
ant here!
The sound of an automobile horn drifted up
from the street, a wavy sound, like a straight,
fair note torn by the wind. She heard, then, his
breathing, and suddenly she sat up straight, gasp-
ing for her own breath, gasping in stark and con-
scious terror. On his face was a look of concern,
but a concern not so great that it screened his
satisfaction; his eyes glowed as she had never
seen them. They were, she thought, like search-
lights, searchlights of the soul!
She cried out, started forward, got to her feet,
a hand covering each cheek, her breath burning


“NOW YOU RNOW " 245
her throat, her lips so dry that they felt as if they
had been seared by hot irons. He smiled, rising
when she did, and watching her with cat-like in-
tensity.
For a long time her eyes questioned his. Then
- she swayed once toward him, held out a suppli-
cating hand, managed a frightened whisper:
“Now you know!”
“Yes,” he said gently; “now I know.”
She retreated, backed away from him until the
table stopped her. She leaned against that and
put out a shaking, wavering arm, her whole pos-
ture one of terrified appeal.
“Then, what,” she said, her whisper clearly
audible, “what are you going to do — to me?”
He was crossing the room. If he heard her,
he made no sign. His face showed a grimness
that deprived her of the strength to repeat her
question. She staggered weakly to the couch.
While she watched him with wide, unwinking
eyes, he went to the telephone and took down the
receiver. Without looking in her direction, he
waited for the reply to his signal. When it came,
he instructed:
“Operator, please tell those people in the re-
ception room they may come up now — to Miss
Haskell's apartment.”
Replacing the receiver, he lingered at the desk,
sunk in profound thought. He remembered the


“NOW YOU RNOW '' 247
She was, perhaps, so stunned by all the anguish
of this day that she could not respond to the dic-
tates of prudence. With all her dreams made
mockeries, what did she care? What could she
care? Could she think even?
He decided: “No; she wouldn't repeat it if
I asked her. I’ve got to trust to the effect of
what the others say to compel her to tell. It's
my one chance — and hers.”
He felt sorry for her — immensely sorry. Al-
though she had refused to believe it, he had been
sorry for her all through this dragging and
punishing week, but never so sorry for her as at
this minute when he planned to make her speak
the truth.


THE TELEFT 249
the rug at her feet, her heavy eyelids lowered, her
pale face impassive.
Darden was thinking: “If she didn't speak,
if she didn't make that confession, I’m taking a
dangerous chance.” He reassured himself, as
he had done before: “But I saw the muscles of
her throat move — and her lips! She did tell
me!”
He was standing on the rug by the window, fac-
ing the others like a lecturer before his audience.
Buckner had sat down on the opposite side of
the room from the couch, putting the reading
lamp between Mary and himself. On the sen-
ator's right, across the table from Darden, was
Miss Conner. Nash leaned against the door into
the passage.
Their movements, the rustle of their finding
places, ceased, and immediately the silence be-
came oppressive, disagreeable. Miss Colvin
sighed, as if she did that in lieu of uttering an
exclamation of impatience. Martha Conner ad-
justed the brim of her hat, trying to see Darden
clearly.
“Turn on the other lights, please, Captain
Nash,” he said in a low voice that vibrated a
little.
So far, he controlled that group because they
credited him with knowledge — or with alleged
facts — from which each one of them feared some


TELE THEFT 251
attitude an impassive mind, a drugged indiffer-
eInCe.
“First of all,” he continued, outwardly confi-
dent, “I want to thank Captain Nash for finding
the murderer. The little I’ve done has been con-
cerned with identifying the thief of that infor-
mation.” His voice took on a new resonance;
he no longer seemed genial, but had suddenly
become hard, unbending, as if his true, relentless
personality broke through the disguise of his
softly curling white hair and his misty, melan-
choly eyes. “Now, as to the theft: the facts in-
dicate, so far, that it might have been done in
this apartment: or that it might have been done
in Revis' house the night of the murder when the
senator was there; or Senator Buckner may have
himself given the information to Revis. If –”
“I deny that here and now !” Buckner broke
in, his effort to restrain his anger putting hoarse-
ness into his voice.
“I know, Senator,” Darden retorted with a
suavity that emphasized the relative unimport-
ance of mere denial. “That's why Miss Con-
ner's here. If she’ll —”
“I came here,” Buckner interrupted him again,
“on your suggestion that my suspicions of Mal-
loy and his absurd charges against me might be
settled without publicity. But, if any woman
who has a grudge against me, or thinks she has —


THE THEFT 253
*
lap. But for that, she gave no sign of being
alive.
“The information was taken while you were
in here. I’ll tell you how — if you haven’t sus-
pected it already.” Buckner leaned forward
quickly, watching him closely, as if to find the
traces of sarcasm on his lips.
Nash, taking two steps into the room, stood
behind Miss Conner. His prominent lips were
open. He was staring at Miss Haskell. Miss
Colvin, seeing that, glowered at him, her brows
drawn together. He did not appear to see her.
The movement of the springs of the couch, in
response to her restlessness, raised and lowered
Miss Haskell, who, for all the attention she paid
to it, might have been dead.
“From the reflection in a wing of the revolving
door of the lobby,” Darden continued, “it’s easy
to see when the elevator's in the upper part of
the building, and in that way to enter without
bing observed by the elevator boy. This thief
took advantage of that, avoided the telephone
operator also and came up to this floor by way of
the stairs. As the door to this apartment is gen-
erally left open when one of the occupants is in,
the rest was easy: to slip into the passage out
there, to go through your overcoat pockets, to
take out the draft and copy it.
“That is, two pages of it were copied. Evi-


254 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
dently, there was an interruption, or miscalcula-
tion of the time the copying would require. But
it's easy to see how it was done.”
He waved his hand, disclaiming any shrewd-
ness in explaining the commission of the theft.
“But the identity of the thief is another matter.
So far as the manner of the stealing is concerned,
Miss Colvin suggested to me yesterday that it
had been done in the very way I’ve just outlined
— only, she made a definite accusation; she said
a man had done it.” He paused briefly. “She
named the man — Malloy.”
He had called their attention to Addie in time
for all of them to have their eyes focussed on her
when he gave Malloy's name. They saw her
consternation and the frightened impulse that
made her catch at Miss Haskell's hand when the
younger woman, exhibiting her first emotion in
all that scene, shrank from her, looking at her
with eyes widened by horror. For the space of
a long-drawn breath the eyes of the two women
dealt with each other, questioning, resentful,
demolishing a friendship of years.
Miss Haskell's white lips moved uncertainly,
without sound, and moved a second time, to whis-
per: “Impossible!” Save for her eyes, her
face expressed nothing; it had no colour; but in
the eyes Miss Colvin saw a heaviness of grief, a
final touch of despair, that made her turn away.


THE THEFT 255
Darden, seeing Miss Haskell sink again into
apathy, was dismayed. He was aware of a
slight dampness all over his body. His nerves
were no longer trustworthy. If he described the
theft and told all he knew about the murder, and
if he drew from the others what they were willing
to tell, and she still refused to speak — if that
lethargy defied all the shocks to which he could
subject it — why, what then?
This reasoning went on in the back of his brain
while he continued his description of the theft.
He had to exert himself to inject a certain vigour
into what he said. He was not interested in it.
What he was interested in was to draw the truth
from that pale, still, uncaring woman — the only
person in all the world who knew — knew abso-
lutely the name of the murderer.
Still, he would not give up. He had just be-
gun' And he was right— he knew he was right!
He continued :
“But Miss Colvin was mistaken. It was not
Malloy. Only this afternoon I came into posses-
sion of direct proof of that — proof of who the
thief was. I found it through handwriting evi-
dence. The person who copied those two pages
of the draft did so by laying the writing paper
on top of the document. A pencil was used, and,
owing to the heavy pressure, there were left on
the document indentations — like writing with-


THE THEFT 257
forward drooping pose, it was as though, having
seen the distant but nonetheless terrible thing,
she had turned and gone indoors, shutting it out
of her sight for ever.
The thin shadow between her brows disap-
peared. Her former immobility enveloped her
again, from head to foot.
“Will nothing move her? Nothing, rouse her
to what has been done to her — what will be done
to her?” Darden asked himself in another access
of doubt, but without altering in the slightest the
condemnatory expression of his face, which was
turned to Addie.
“Why, it's absurd, unbelievable!” Miss Colvin
was saying. She was as pale as Mary now, the
patches of rouge standing out on her cheeks like
pieces of scarlet cloth with irregular edges.
“My handwriting! You never saw my writ-
ing!”
“I did this afternoon,” he contradicted,
“in some of your clerical work at the depart-
ment — thanks to the obligingness of your
Chief.”
“You’re trying to victimize me!” she pro-
tested. “You’re trying to prove me guilty be-
cause you’ve failed to find the real—”
Darden stopped her, putting up an imperious
hand. His quick ear had caught the sound of
footsteps in the corridor outside.


258 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
“Captain Nash,” he said, “see who that is, will
you?”
The officer admitted Miss Patton and Malloy.
It was at the woman that everybody looked, their
attention caught by the awkward unsureness of
her step and by her stiff, unnatural smile. Dar-
den, remembering his first interview with her,
saw at once what was the matter. Miss Patton
had been drinking.
“I’m glad you’ve come,” he said to both of
them, matter-of-fact, business-like. “We’re just
about to identify the murderer of Edward Revis.”
“And I’m going to help you,” Miss Patton said
solemnly. She had dropped, a little clumsily,
into the chair Malloy pushed forward for her at
Miss Conner's right. Darden detected in her
tone the same weariness, the same pessimism, he
had heard during that first interview, when she
had proclaimed her profound compassion for
“the other woman.” She added, with a doleful-
ness that would have been comical under other
circumstances: “Mr. Malloy tells me I'm in
danger of arrest. In that case, helping the other
fellow ceases to be a virtue.”


XXV
THE MURDER
& HANK you very much,” the detective ac-
knowledged her offer pleasantly. “I
shall call on you in a moment.”
He concealed his suspense admirably. He
looked toward Miss Haskell. She was still and
silent, her eyes downcast, her face blank of all
expression.
He had a wild, but nevertheless real, desire to
go close to her and take her listless hand, to shout
in her ear, to demand loudly: “Can't you see
your very life and happiness are at stake? What
was that name? What was that you said to me
— here in the shadows? Say it again!”
On the heels of that came once more his hope-
ful thought: “She’ll speak as soon as she does
realize! She did speak! I saw her lips move,
the muscles of her throat. I can’t be mistaken.”
He determined then, with finality, to make the
supreme test. He would prove himself right by
declaring that name, relying on her for the con-
firmation he needed — relying on his own shrewd-
ness to persuade her, to force her, into speech.
259


THE MURDER 261
and gleaming in the perfect pallor in which they
were imbedded. Their expression was of star-
tled reproach, a vague and uncertain rebuke, as
if, recognizing her danger, she could not yet de-
fine its nature and extent. She was, in every
particular, like a woman coming out of a trance.
She was freeing herself from the stupor of all
her suffering — freeing herself from that in order
to meet a new menace, another anguish ' The
consciousness growing in her face did not lessen
her look of sorrow. Her countenance was devas-
tated of all vivacity, all liveliness, all the swift
play of fancy and wit. It showed only a strug-
gling thoughtfulness, a slow and fatigued under-
standing.
But he felt his old confidence flood through
him. He had been right all along! — all this
week! She had whispered to him — there in the
shadows!
Nevertheless, he would give her time. Be-
sides, he must yet make sure of compelling her
to speak. So far, he had done no more than catch
her alarmed attention, call her back from noth-
ingness.
He switched to another aspect of the mystery.
“What did happen in that house was this:
Miss Conner came in, joining Revis. They were
joined by Senator Buckner. Both of them had
come under cover of secrecy, indicating no spe-


262 THE UNLIGHTED BIOUSE
cial pride in the project of the night. She has
said she left the two men together, a revolver
in the hands of Revis.
“Next, the Senator left, by the back way, got
into his machine and regained the safety of his
own house.
“But others were there that night. Malloy
was there — and explains that he went to
frighten Revis, not to kill him. Miss Haskell
went in with me when I discovered the body.
She has said she hadn’t made a visit there previ-
ous to that. Miss Patton, another acquaintance
mutual to Revis and Buckner, was asked by Revis
to be there. She has claimed all along that she
didn't go.
“Now!” He rapped out the monosyllable.
“If Buckner didn't do that murder, if Malloy
didn't, if Miss Haskell and Miss Patton are to be
believed and, therefore, acquitted of all possibil-
ity of doing it, and if Miss Conner didn't make a
second trip back there and kill him — who did?
Either we leave the case with suspicion pointing
almost with certainty to Buckner — for, of all
those I've named, he was the last to see Revis
alive — or we can say that somebody else, not
yet named, is guilty.
“I do say that! Malloy, as a matter of fact,
was in the house once long before Miss Haskell
and I followed him in. He heard some of the


THE MURDER 263
talk between Revis and Buckner. He heard the
sound of a woman's voice and thought it was
Miss Haskell's. As soon as he got that idea, he
left the house, preferring not to overhear what
she might say.
“But his determination to punish Revis led
him to return. It was on this second visit that
we followed him in. Miss Haskell, who had first
arrived there at eleven o'clock, hadn’t been able
to summon the courage to go in. Finding the
house in darkness, she had loitered outside.
“She found it dark because the murderer had
been there and left, turning off the lights during
the dash from the house to the basement — as
Dr. Felton has described it. Do you see? After
Buckner left Revis and before Miss Haskell and
I entered the house, the man had been murdered.
He had been murdered by a woman, the woman
whom Felton saw running away. That woman's
motive was jealousy.”
With the exception of Miss Haskell, the women
shot sidelong glances at each other, as if each ex-
pected to see on the face of another confession
of guilt. Buckner's relief was obvious. He un-
folded his arms, crossed his knees, relaxed in
every fibre of his body. A slow, deep breath, like
a sigh, parted his lips.
“On that point,” Malloy was suggesting,
“Miss Patton might be of help.”


264 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
Darden looked at her and bowed. “Yes?”
he invited.
“Yes,” she replied; “reluctant help.”
Her solemnity had deepened, so much so that
she seemed to combat a great grief. She had
difficulty with her lips and her eyes. The
warmth of the room, combined with the alcohol,
had slowed her thought processes and at the same
time brought her emotions to the surface.
“Jealous women!” she said mournfully.
“Pathetic women! And this one, the one Ed.
Revis told me about last Sunday, she's pathetic,
too. I felt sorry for her. I told you that, Mr.
Darden. He said he had her like this.” She
raised her right hand from her lap and closed the
fingers in the gesture Darden remembered. “He
said: ‘Because of her foolishness, I’ll know
what Grimes Buckner knows. She can get the
stuff I want.” But the way he laughed at her,
made fun of her — that was why I pitied her!”
She sighed profoundly, a doleful sound that
was loud and distinct in the quiet room.
“Did he identify her?” Darden asked.
“Brutally!” she replied drearily. “He
laughed at her because she was old, because she
was ugly, because she thought he loved her, be-
cause she had a de Bergerac nose and a Sappho
heart — most of all, because she thought she


268 THE UNLIGHTED House
And yet, he felt like a conqueror. His brain
glowed.
“I have something to say — now,” Mary con-
tinued.
One look at her transferred the absorbed inter-
est of all of them from him to her. It was not
because her face had changed. That was un-
altered, white to the lips. It was not because she
displayed any bodily quickening whatever. She
did not move. The rise and fall of her bosom
to her slow breathing was hardly perceptible.
They were held by her eyes, which, after the first
glance at Darden, made the circle of the group,
as if to proclaim to each individual there the sad
necessity of hearing her. After that look, they
could not doubt that, forced by her sorrow to
speak, she felt even a greater sorrow at having
to speak.
Her words came in the deep and unnatural con-
tralto Darden had heard before, measured, de-
liberate, unaccompanied by a gesture, falling
from colourless lips that seemed scarcely to move
at all. The effect of this was almost of ghostli-
ness, as if, dead to most things, she used all the
life remaining in her for the exposition of cold
truth — truth untouched by anger.
The silence in the room was like suspended
animation.
“I can tell you who's guilty. I will tell you


THE MURDER 269
how I discovered that. I will tell you all about
it. I should have told you long ago, but — but
I believed it had been done in self-defence, as
the result of deadly menace.— I was deceived.
I have been deceived a long time.”
Her brows went together; a faint line showed
on her forehead; she appeared to contemplate the
immensity of the deception that had victimized
her.
“You see, the trouble was, I yielded to the
temptation to sympathize with anybody who had
fought him — he was cruel, low. I had had
ample proof of that. But tonight — this claim
of love!”
She straightened, slowly turned her head and,
chin resting hard on her shoulder, gazed into the
blinking eyes of Miss Colvin.
“You!” she said, with no alteration of man-
ner except that her voice, which until this mo-
ment had expressed an incomparable woe, subtly
revealed an even deeper anguish. “You killed
him — and you had served him.”
Addie neither moved nor spoke. A futile ter-
ror and a curious, baffled attentiveness were
mingled in her expression. Miss Haskell in-
clined her head, as if never to look in that direc-
tion again.
“You’re right, Mr. Darden. I went to that
house, determined to defy the man, to tell him


270 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
that nothing could make me yield to his demands.
I had intended to take my revolver, but at the
last I weakened. I was afraid — I might kill
him. I went unarmed, leaving the revolver in
the bottom drawer of my dresser.
“You’re mistaken about the lights. They
were on when I got there. But my courage
failed me. I couldn’t go up to the door. Still, I
couldn’t come away without telling him — as
I’d planned.
“I walked around the block. When I was
on the square back of his house, near the alley
there, I saw a woman run out of the alley and
down the street, toward me. I knew at once
she’d come from Revis’ house — it was my in-
stinctive conclusion. The next minute I recog-
nized her. It was Addie Colvin.”
She moved at last, getting to her feet with a
motion so strong and so sudden that it announced
her horror of being near that woman any longer.
She came away from the couch and put her hand
on the back of a chair, near the table, standing
so that all of them, except Buckner, were under
her glance.
“Her face,” she resumed, “was like death. I
thought then it was entirely due to fright. I
put out my hand, caught her by the sleeve. She
was gasping for breath. She hadn’t recognized
me. When I took hold of her, she backed away


THE MURDER 271
is
from me until she was leaning against the fence.
She cowered there; she couldn't say anything, at
first.
“I asked her what she had done. “Don’t
ask me!’ she told me, in an awful whisper.
Then I asked her where she had been. She said,
finally: ‘Trying to save you. Trying to shut
that man’s mouth !” Then she came very close
to me, still whispering, and told me: “I had to
do it, Mary! I had to . He made me!’
“When I asked her to explain, she caught me
by the arm, hurrying me away. It was very cold,
and the wind was high. But, under a street
lamp, I saw that her face was wet. When we
had gone as far as Thirty-third Street, I stopped
and asked her again what she had done.”
Miss Haskell paused. She seemed to brace
herself, inwardly, for the climax of her narra-
tion.
“She said: ‘I don't know. I may have killed
him. I shot at him. I shot him ' ' Then she ex-
plained that there was danger of our being seen
there, that she had better leave me. She did so.
She was at home by eleven o'clock, the time she
would have returned if she had stayed at the
theatre. Eleven o'clock was the time I was to
have — was to have seen the man. I had gone
early, in my excitement.
“The house had for me, now, an irresistible


272 THE UNLIGHTED HOUSE
fascination. I went back. I had to know
whether he was really dead. But I couldn't go
in. The house was dark then. It looked dan-
gerous, repellent. I delayed.
“Then I saw you go into the yard, Mr. Darden.
I recognized you. Mr. Malloy came up the
street. And I knew at once he had come to see
Revis. I couldn’t stay away and wait. I had to
see what would happen — in that house.”
Her eyelids fell; her head sank, inclining far
down on her left shoulder. Strength went out
of her. When she raised her head, struggling
against a mortal weariness, her eyes were half-
shut. Her knees bent. She contrived to swing
the chair a little toward her and to collapse
slowly upon it, drooping forward.
By a supreme effort, she lifted her hand, ask-
ing their indulgence. They waited, in a flawless
silence.
She continued, her head still a little inclined to
one side. She did not look up.
“She told me, when I got back here that night,
she had gone there solely to keep him from an-
noying me. She said, as she had said at first,
he'd forced her to fire, he had struck her twice;
she was afraid he would kill her.” She raised
her head, letting them see the bitterness of her
faint Smile. “And I believed her. She had
never lied to me — so far as I knew.


THE MURDER 273
“But I know now I was mistaken. There
have been many things—furtiveness — fears —
a new light. I know now she killed him because
her betrayal of me, her theft, had failed to buy
his — his love!” Her head drooped again, at
that profanation. “And,” she completed the
catalogue of her ignorance, “I didn't know then,
hadn't the remotest idea, that she'd stolen that
information. I never dreamed until here, to-
night — never dreamed of perfidy like that —
anywhere — in all —”
Her speech, trailing off to a whisper of weak-
ness, was lost in the sound of Addie's denial.
“I was never in the man's house!” The ac-
cused woman's voice was shrill and metallic.
“You’re blaming me on the say-so of two women;
both of them had more reason than I ever had to
kill him; both of them are under suspicion. I
tell you I was never in the house — never!”
Her face was a mask of terror. The salient
cheek-bones, capped by the ragged patches of
rouge, took on an added sharpness that threat-
ened to cut through the flesh. Her nose looked
larger, her lips thinner. Her eyes, as she glared
at Darden, were like glass back of their inces-
santly winking lids.
She repeated: “Never, I tell you! I was
never there!”
“I’ve proof that you were,” retorted Darden.


276 THE UNLIGHTED BIOUSE
nition of her presence, came close to the detective,
speaking in a guarded and conciliatory tone.
“Well, I’ve gone through with this, Darden.
I did it at your request. Now I want you to do
me a favour in return. See to it — will you?—
that those women keep their mouths shut about
me.”
“Mouths shut!” Darden echoed in assumed
blankness.
“Why, yes!” Buckner said impatiently.
“Hang it, man, they could embarrass me —
seriously!”
Darden's temper flared, stirred by the contrast
between that man of coarse and low instincts,
with his crafty eagerness now to keep from the
public all knowledge of his affairs with women,
sordid affairs — the contrast between his selfish-
ness and the higher selfishness to which Mary
had fallen a victim, her mistaken but ardent be-
lief that, for the sake of her love, she might as-
sume the burden of hiding another's guilt.
She sat there, utterly spent, her head bowed, in
a desolate weariness, an atoning despair, that
was, in its way, commanding, august. And
Buckner, the undeserving incentive of her
mistake, the author of the most poignant of all
her griefs, stood within a few inches of her, ig-
noring her very existence, babbling about his
“ embarrassment'''


XXVI
THE LAST OF THE MYSTERY
IGHT months went over — and the Revis
E case had long since ceased to be a sen-
sation.
It was Indian summer, that time when Wash-
ington becomes a wonder city of russet and
brown, every avenue a thoroughfare of gold. In
Miss Haskell's apartment there was a dreamy
quiet. The young man at the window turned
from his survey of the Virginia hills, blue and
indistinct in the mistiness of distance and fading
sunlight. -
“I saw Darden down-town today,” he said
gently, as if constrained to refer to a painful sub-
ject. “He’s just back from that seven-months
assignment in the West.— We owe him a great
deal — an immeasurable debt.”
“I know,” Miss Haskell assented warmly, and
added, as a surprised afterthought: “But it
wouldn’t be like him to remind you of it.”
Malloy laughed, a low, appreciative note.
“No; it wouldn't. I reminded him.”
He had his hands in his pockets, shoulders
slightly stooped, and was lifting and lowering
278